By Mark Squibb
October 6, 2023
Many a frog calls Second Pond home, but only one of them, as far as is known, is blue.
Leanne Murphy and her husband Jeff Cahill live in Calgary, Alberta, but hail from the Goulds.
The family makes the trip to Newfoundland each summer with children Jude, 10, and Layla, 7, in tow.
“Last summer when we were home, Jude and Layla had discovered a frog pond down at the end of Donovan’s Road, and so they caught a few frogs, and fell in love with catching frogs, because they live in Calgary, and you just can’t do that there,” said Murphy, who maintained it’s important that her children experience a true Newfoundland summer each year.
Returning to the Goulds this summer, Murphy said the kids were both eager to get back to the frog pond and were diving into the gully chasing after frogs on only their second day back.
And although frogs are unique in their own right, there was one that stood out from the rest — a rare blue frog.
Catching the blue frog, which appeared to be larger than many of the other frogs in the pond, became a top priority, and with the aplomb of Ahab chasing after his whale, Jude set himself about the task.
“He kept spotting this blue frog, and eventually he caught it, and he was over the moon with excitement,” said Murphy.
After taking some pictures of the frog, they released it back to its habitat so it could go about whatever business it is that frogs attend to.
Of the dozens of frogs in the pond, there appeared to be only the one blue frog to be found.
Blue frogs are incredibly rare. Scientists say that most frogs appear green because they sport a layer of yellow pigment atop their grey skin. Frogs lacking this yellow pigment, however, appear blue in colour.
Brian Murphy, who is Jude and Layla’s grandfather, said that catching the blue frog was definitely a highlight of the trip, and that out of the blue (pardon the pun,) Jude would say, “I can't believe that I caught a blue frog,” for days afterwards.
Outside of catching frogs, Jude and Layla enjoyed hiking the Manuel’s River trail in CBS (“they wanted to go there everyday,” said Leanne), looking at fossils at the Mistaken Point Ecological Reserve, watching whales at St. Vincent’s, visiting Bowring Park, and exploring the Petty Harbour Mini Aquarium.
