Photo: Boyd Essex
Many frog species are threatened by human activities, so by providing pockets of usable habitat for them will boost their numbers. Encourage your neighbours to create frog-friendly habitat in their yards too, to give the frogs more room to move.
It’s not just frogs that will benefit from your frog-friendly garden – birds, butterflies, reptiles and small marsupials may find refuge there too, creating a mini ecosystem in your back yard.
Don't have room for a pond? Make a frog hotel or frog pot instead!
Setting up a frog pond
Step 1: Find a container
You can create a frog pond from just about any non-metallic water-holding container. Possibilities include:
- A children’s plastic pool
- An old plastic water tank
- Half a wine barrel
- A hole in the ground lined with a plastic or rubber pool liner
- Bath tub.
Don’t use a metal container, or any other metal objects in your pond, as frogs and tadpoles can be sensitive to the metal impurities that they leach into the water.
Step 2: Find a good location
If possible, choose a naturally low-lying area that receives both sun and shade.
There should be plenty of vegetation around and in the pond – choose an already-vegetated area, or add your own plants (see step 5).
Step 3: Install your pond
Dig a hole to fit your chosen container, add sand or gravel to level the base, and check with a spirit level.
If you are using a pond liner, you’ll need a piece big enough to allow at least a 40cm overhang all the way around. Don’t trim it to size until after you’ve filled the pond with water. Use some of the dirt from the hole to build up a small wall around the pond, and secure the liner over the wall using large rocks.
Fill the hole or container with water and make sure it’s secure. If you are using tap water, let it sit for at least five days before adding any life, to allow chlorine and other chemicals to dissipate.
Step 4: Fit out your frog home
The pond should have shallow edges so adult frogs can easily hop in and out. This will also allow other animals to drink from your pond without falling in.
Ideally the water should be 30-50cm deep at its deepest point. Add some washed sand or gravel to the bottom, and place logs, rocks and pebbles to create a variety of depths. This will help your pond accommodate a wider variety of frogs with different preferences.
Step 5: Add some plants
Plant a wide range of vegetation around the pond – grasses and sedges are ideal planted densely around the water’s edge as they provide lots of great hiding spots for frogs. Sedges also provide male frogs with higher points to call from.
A variety of water plants, such as native reeds and rushes, will keep the water oxygenated and provide food and hiding places for tadpoles. Leave the plants in their pots and place in the water at different depths.
Floating plants like native duckweed and azolla will also provide protection, but make sure they cover no more than half of the water’s surface.
Don’t forget to make the rest of your back yard frog-friendly too! Try using a variety of native plants to achieve multiple levels of foliage, including a dense understorey of grasses and groundcovers which will provide shelter for frogs and other small animals.
Step 6: Add some frog-friendly species
Ensure your pond doesn’t become a nursery for wrigglers (mosquito larvae) by adding some native fish to your pond. Small Redlands natives such as Pacific Blue-eyes and Firetail Gudgeons are considered frog-friendly fish.
A well-designed pond will attract dragonflies – they also breed around water, and they and their larvae eat mosquitoes and wrigglers.
Never add exotic fish to your pond, such as mosquito fish or goldfish.
Step 7: Have food ready for new frogs
Frogs’ favourite foods are easily attracted. Place a small solar light near your pond to attract flying insects like moths.
Your pond may benefit from being close to a compost heap, which can also attract small flying insects.
Tadpoles will happily feed on the decaying vegetation and some water plants and algae, so a well-designed pond should sustain them without any help from you.
Step 8: Wait for the frogs to arrive
Once your pond is all set up, don’t worry about finding frogs for it. Frogs will find your new pond all by themselves.
Transporting frogs or tadpoles to or from your pond is illegal under the Nature Conservation Act 1992 as it can move species out of their preferred habitat. It can also spread diseases such as Chytrid fungus disease (chytridiomycosis) which has killed many frogs in recent years and may have been responsible for the extinction of some Queensland species.
Watch out for toads
Cane toads prefer open water bodies, so prevent your frog pond from becoming a home for toads by planting dense vegetation around the edges.
Keep an eye out for signs of cane toads breeding in your pond. Unlike native frog eggs, which look like floating clumps of white foam, toad eggs are small black dots suspended in long clear jelly ‘shoelaces’. Remove the ‘shoelace’ from the pond by running a stick through the water and catching it up, then simply leave it on the side of the garden to dry out.
Toad tadpoles can be distinguished from native tadpoles by their behaviour and colour. Toad tadpoles swim in a swarm, whereas native tadpoles do not keep such close company. Toad tadpoles are black all over, but native tadpoles are always lighter underneath than on top.
Learn more about toads by going to the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry.
Points to remember
Always supervise children around your frog pond.
Check for any underground pipes or cables before you start digging.
Keep cats inside at night. Cats will eat frogs and other small wildlife if left to roam, making your frog pond a dangerous place to be.
Make sure you include only native plants and fish. Exotic species can escape and become pests in local waterways, impacting on the native wildlife, and some fish species, such as mosquito fish, will actually eat tadpoles. Especially avoid plant and fish species that are already established pests in the Redlands, and be aware that aquariums often sell these – contact IndigiScapes for more information.
Grow your frog home without the use of chemical pesticides and fertilisers, and stick to naturally-derived organic fertilisers. Frogs gain all the water they need to survive simply by absorbing it through their moist skin. Their skin is permeable to other substances too, which makes them extremely sensitive to pollutants.