Eastern Gray Treefrogs Among the Milkweed

After a stretch of very hot weather, Bob and I were desperate to get out for a hike.  The Beare Hill Wetlands in Rouge National Urban Park, in northeast Toronto, Ontario, seemed a logical place to explore.   Among the various butterflies and insects sighted that day, we also managed to pick out some Eastern Gray Treefrogs.

This section of Rouge Park is located on the east side of Toronto.

Every year, we can pretty much count on finding some Gray Treefrogs along one section of the trail at these wetlands. Again this year, we were not disappointed although it took some serious looking.

It helped that the frogs had different colours compared to the leaves of the plants where they sat. As it turns out, Gray Treefrogs change their colour from green to gray and brown in response to their environment and activities.

Being such tiny creatures that tuck themselves in the shade of large leaves, it wasn’t easy locating them among the hundreds of appropriate plants.

I proceeded to take photos of the first Eastern Gray Treefrog that we sighted.

Bob picked out another treefrog sitting a mere foot away on a separate milkweed plant.

On our way down to the ponds, we scrutinized all the vegetation in hopes of finding something interesting like this Eastern Amberwing.

The movement of a Brilliant Jumping Spider caught my eye and demanded attention.

A Clouded Sulphur Butterfly was kind enough to sit a spell allowing a decent photo that captures the pink edging on its wings.

A flicker of movement on a shady evergreen bough drew our eyes to an Eastern Comma Butterfly.

As we moved along the trail to the backside of the ponds, our outing became a 3-frog day when we noticed a third Eastern Gray Treefrog hoping to avoid detection.

Frame To Frame – Bob and Jean

 

Frame To Frame – Bob and Jean