October 1st 2010    Tim Candler

    My own Artist, as her season ends, proceeds to the Doodle-Bug pits where a strange entertainment is to be had from feeding ants to Doodle-Bug.   "I wish we had Toads to feed," she remarked in a manner I will describe as wistful. 

    Toads will sit there apparently, and if you are still young you can toss them living things to munch on.  Toads, I suppose, are more like Chameleon.   Frogs, however, are different.  Too skittish, or shy for public displays of eating   So to see a frog eat, a person must acquire an ability to stand stock still for an hour or more, because if you toss something in his direction he will leap for the pond, sink into the murk, disappearing altogether.  

    By a coincidence I was in place beside the artist when one of her Frogs leapt from the ground eighteen inches into the Butterfly Bush.   It was a transitory moment.  I saw the bush tremble, and I saw the Frog land.  But mostly I saw his back leg spread like a wing and flailing around in a manner most inept.  

    How Frogs have managed to feed themselves all these generations I cannot begin to imagine.  A clumsier move I have never seen.  And there he was back on his part of the ground, proud as a stone and snack-less.

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