# The Vernal Pools

**URL:** <https://scanalyst.fourmilab.ch/t/the-vernal-pools/5869>\
**Category:** General Discussion\
**Created:** [31 March 2025 16:00 UTC](https://scanalyst.fourmilab.ch/t/the-vernal-pools/5869 "2025-03-31T16:00:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Hypatia](https://scanalyst.fourmilab.ch/user_avatar/scanalyst.fourmilab.ch/hypatia/32/100_2.png) [@Hypatia](https://scanalyst.fourmilab.ch/u/Hypatia)\
**Post date:** [31 March 2025 16:00 UTC](https://scanalyst.fourmilab.ch/t/the-vernal-pools/5869/1 "2025-03-31T16:00:48Z")

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I heard the frogs in the vernal pools today. That’s where they mate, in those puddles we get in low-lying areas in Spring. These aren’t the high-chirping tree frogs we call knee-deeps, these are the larger land critters. And their mating call sounds a lot like a bird’s cluck, but just slightly more metallic, like a clunk.  
So of course I thought of Edna St Vincent Millay’s poem “Assault”:

“ I had forgotten how the frogs must sound  
After a year of silence, else, I think  
I should not so have ventured forth alone  
At dusk upon this unfrequented road.

I am waylaid by Beauty. Who will walk  
Between me and the crying of the frogs?  
Oh, savage Beauty, suffer me to pass,  
That am a timid woman, on her way  
From one house to another.”