Frog call

My good friend and watercolor artist Pat Glenn e-mails me now and then with nice comments about my articles and questions about the flora and fauna around his place outside of Blanco. Recently, he's been stumped by a strange call at night. This week, he recorded it and sent it to me. I tried to figure it out but decided I'd better let an expert handle it. So I forwarded the recording to Dr. David Cantantella, a professor of integrative biology at the University of Texas at Austin and curator of herpetology at the Texas Natural History Collections.

"This sounds like Pseudacris streckeri," he wrote back. "It calls early in the spring, usually before March."

The species is commonly called Strecker's chorus frog. Here's another recording of the frog. Thanks, Dr. Cantatella! In the meantime, I also let Pat know, of course.

"He sure did nail it," Pat wrote me back. "That is great! Thank you so much. I am amazed! Thank your friend for me. Now that you have solved it, what are we gonna do for entertainment? I just am amazed at this, there is no doubt."