We used to offer farm stays to foreign travellers when we owned an acreage

in Victoria; many people from around the world stayed with us over the

years. I’ll never forget the day I opened the fridge to find a large taped

brown box inside. Upon enquiring as to what this was, a young man from

California sheepishly informed me that there was a frog in the box. At first I

merely laughed him off, responding that he could “pull the other leg as it had bells on it”.

“Ask your husband. He told me to do it!” he replied. Upon further enquiry

my husband told me that Dustin had found an enormous Bullfrog

(Lithobates catesbeiana) on our driveway and didn’t know what to do with

We knew that the Bullfrog is bad news, it has no natural predators and

eats birds, garter snakes and ducklings and other smaller species of frogs.

Most of B.C.’s native frogs are little more than a bite-sized snack for

Bullfrogs, and there is evidence that Bullfrog colonizations of lakes are

followed by declines in the native Red-legged frog and Pacific Chorus frog

populations.

My husband very astutely phoned UVic and talked to Purnima

Govindarajulu, an expert on the subject of Bullfrogs. The humane advice

given was to slow its metabolism down by putting it in the fridge, and then

to put it in the freezer where it would slowly freeze to death. “If you think

you are going to put that thing in the freezer with all the food you can think

again!” I said, admonishing my husband for not knowing me better.

This Bullfrog has invaded many lakes locally, where you may hear the deep

bwaa, bwaa call of the males in the spring and summer; the calls can carry

up to a kilometre. Sometimes, when approaching a shoreline, you may hear

frogs leaping into the water with loud splashes and “eep!” cries; these are

juvenile Bullfrogs, avoiding you as a potential predator. Locals often make a

concentrated effort to eradicate them, which involves going out on the water

at night with headlamps to stun the frogs, and then bashing their heads in.

A sunrise canoe trip on Beaver Lake once resulted in us scooping up a huge

tadpole on our paddle. Bullfrogs spend one or sometimes two years in the

tadpole stage, compared to just a few months for many other frog species,

and they are large – up to 15 cm long!

Fast forward to last year in our new home in Yellow Point, the day we found

another Bullfrog in our fish pond. We captured it in a net, just at the time our neighbour, a marine biologist, and his three little girls walked by. He

grabbed the frog by its hind legs and smashed its head against a rock. The

three little girls shrieked as did I! The next day he thanked us for his dinner

of frogs legs.

By now you may be feeling sorry for the Bullfrog, but they are causing

havoc in the wild. They were introduced to B.C. in the 1930’s and 1940’s for

their meaty legs by wannabe frog farmers. I guess Canadians did not latch

on to this culinary delight, so the frogs were released into the wild. They

have now spread through much of the Lower Mainland and southern

Vancouver Island, and have also been found in the South Okanagan.

Normally I find frogs rather cute, but the sight of this one gives me the

shivers.

Carolyn Herriot is author of The Zero Mile Diet and The Zero Mile Diet Cookbook Available at your local bookstore. She grows IncrEdibles! in Yellow Point. www.incredibles.vision

See all articles by Carolyn Herriot