Can you actually see a sound? Yesterday while I was exploring Prince William Forest Park, I heard a whole lot of croaking. Eventually I spotted one really loud male toad with an inflated vocal sac, which was pretty cool. What were even cooler were the concentric ripples in the water generated by the toad’s croaking.
The second image shows the toad resting in between performances, whose main purpose is to attract mates. His song did not appear to have had any immediate benefits, although I was certainly impressed.
UPDATE: I initially identified this as a frog, but fellow blogger and wildlife enthusiast Walter Sanford pointed out to me that this is probably an American Toad (Anaxyrus americanus).
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
I have to show my son this-he’ll be so excited by it!very cool!
Awesome photos Mike! Really like the the one with “seeing the sound”.
Great shots, especially the first one, but the second one just makes me laugh, for his face is actually cute! Makes you wonder what he is thinking. 🙂
That is terrific! I’ve heard and seen lots of frogs, but have never seen the water disturbed by their symphony! As always, you did great!!
A perfect illustration. Reminds me of a story a friend of mine told me years ago. He and a friend were in a boat in the channel at Cape Canaveral watching a space shuttle launch. The sound waves created waves in the water that almost capsized the boat. Yes, they were a little too close.
That’s a great visual story, nice.
Now take that and magnify by 100. You can see sound, and feel it. Alligators actually do something similar. And yes, the water has waves. Alligators issue a challenge this way, and can be answered by 10 – 20 others right back. Unnerving when you hear the answer come from a bush you just passed LOL.
I love the immaculate portraiture of the second image but I am absolutely in awe of that first image. That is so incredibly cool to capture that behaviour in such a visible way and I also love the aesthetics of the composition with those concentric rings surrounding the toad plus the rings and bubbles echoing the rounded throat of the toad. Perfection!
Wow. Thanks, Laura, for the glowing description of the image. I was so focused capturing the frog with its vocal sac inflated that I didn’t even notice the ripples until I reviewed my images on my computer.
Nice shot. That’s something I’ve never seen.
Thanks. I suspect that most of the time the frogs and toads have their heads above the water when they croak, so they don’t make ripples. Who knows? I love capturing cool things like this.
This is so cool, Mike! I’ve never noticed such a thing. I will have to look next chance I get.
Thanks, Eliza. I have no idea how common it is, but it is certainly worth looking for. I didn’t even notice the circular pattern when I was taking the shots.
Hi Mike, is it ok with you if I include the second toad image in a “water” post that I’m putting together?
You are more than welcome to use it, Liz. Sorry it took so long to respond–I spent this weekend at a church retreat in a pretty remote area and was blissfully disconnected from technology.
No problem at all Mike! Thank you very much. You must have had a wonderful weekend, away from the distractions of our modern life.
It was a wonderful experience. There was a somewhat weak internet connection available in the main building of the retreat center, but I felt no compelling desire or need to try to connect. The beautiful mountain surroundings and the variety of interesting people present were more than sufficient to fill my waking moments.
[…] April 9, 2019 Visible sound (https://michaelqpowell.com/2019/04/09/visible-sound/) […]