Have you heard the spring peepers sound? Are you wondering, do spring peepers live in West Virginia? Well, they do! If you haven't heard these small frogs, you surely will each spring as they start their chorus in parts of West Virginia. For many of us, the spring peepers in West Virginia are providing a needed sign of spring and a solid reminder that, while many things look very different from year to year, some things look (and sound) exactly the same.
Northern Spring Peepers in West Virginia are small chorus frogs whose songs are among the first signs of spring across the eastern United States.
They can be tan, brown, olive green, or gray and are usually only 1 to 1.5 inches in size.
Spring peepers are most commonly identified by the dark-colored X across their back.
They inhabit wet, wooded areas and are nocturnal insectivores (they eat small insects and are active mostly at night).
Although these West Virginia frogs are small and difficult to spot, they are not difficult to hear.
The easily recognizable song of the spring peeper is actually the male's mating call.
In colder climates, spring peepers spend the winter in hibernation and emerge in early spring ready to breed.
After mating, female spring peepers lay gelatinous egg masses in shallow puddles, pools, and calm streams.
(The egg masses pictured are slightly larger than a spring peeper's would be. The black dot in each egg is the developing tadpole.)
As with all frogs, spring peepers hatch from their eggs as tadpoles and go through several morph stages before reaching adulthood.
Frogs are classified as Amphibians partially because of their ability to morph from water-dwelling tadpoles to land-dwelling frogs.
Thanks, little frogs, for providing us with a welcome bit of normalcy this spring!
Can you hear them where you live? Do you feel like you'll be able to hear when spring peepers come out in West Virginia now? We hope you get a chance to celebrate the season with these delightful and diminutive little creatures!
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