Pick up a frog

[Beagle 2]

I have at the back of my house a crevice.

The reason for the crevice is that the kitchen is in the basement and the window ends halfway horizontally, with the top half looking out on people's passing feet and the bottom half consisting of a crevice with a grate on top.

Through the bars of this grate fall much of the local fauna. Bugs, arachnids and flappy chaps yes, but also mice and, frequently when it rains, frogs.

So, a few times a year I have to rescue some stuck frogs. They always arrive in batches of different sized frogs, which gives the whole thing an extra level of poignancy, their bright little eyes staring out from their bony warty froggy bodies. "Fly our family to safety, dark angel", they seem to whisper, silently. They don't actually ribbet, I imagine they're shitting themselves and largely having a fucking stinker of a day.

I gather them into a plastic tub and relocate to a damp spot under a bush in the garden. Is it the right thing to do? I think so, the frog advice you can get on the internet is of varying quality and believability. There's frog advice sure, but I feel like that advice is written by people who want to have their page clicked on by the sorts of idiots who have found themselves having to google "what will I do with these frogs", rather than commited frog advocates who want to share best practice. For all I know they perish inside 20 minutes.

My technique is to usher them into the tub through friendly encouragement, lighthearted chat and occasional gentle poking. And it works, they're tame with it, they're at the stage when they'll give anything a whack. You've heard the term "mad as a box of frogs"? The reality is a world apart. That phrase should be replaced so it can be used like this: "Have you met Sandra? She's a very timid woman. She's as morose and defeated as a box of frogs".

Anyway, today I was carrying out a rescue when who should fucking arrive but a woman who had come to look at the windows, with one eye on giving us a competitive quote on secondary glazing (the best glazing). What are the chances? I relished the thought of being frog Jesus in front of an adoring double glazing saleswoman. It simply doesn't get any hotter than that.

As I reached into the crevice and demonstrated my compassion, kindness and such a subtle wrist, I imagined the air must have been charged with eroticism. Then she piped up:

"Why don't you just pick them up?"

I replied, stunned:

"Pick them up? With my bare hands?"

"Yes. I would. Just pick them all up."

I didn't pick them up. I wanted to test her mettle, I wanted her to put her money where her mouth was, but it seemed like too much of an escalation to go from "I've come about the windows" to "pick up these frogs now" in under twenty seconds.

How? How would you pick up a frog without causing physical damage to the frog and mental damage to yourself? What was wrong with my technique? I explained that it wasn't the first time I'd done it, who's the expert here? Has she picked up loads of frogs? Does she know where the really good frog advice is on the internet, the strongest stuff? She was so confident.

Or maybe it was marketing patter. "If this cunt thinks I'm better at picking up frogs than him then he's going to be putty in my hands. Frog putty, because I actually like to crush frogs into malleable balls of stress-frog, that's how I unwind after a hard day of forcing overpriced sheets of Perspex on to the sorts of idiots who spend their time googling "what do I do house freezing please".

Pick up a frog?

You wouldn't would you?

A frog?

[PlanktonSideburns]

Show us pictures

[TrenterPercenter]

You use a cupping technique with both hands.  It's a bit tricky as you have to be quick in closing space between your hands in case the frog jumps and you end up crushing its delicate legs as it tries to escape.  Also don't clasp too hard as again they are delicate and you could easily damage it.  Once you have it in your hands securely you'll want to take the cute little kermit to the kitchen, burst it and then drop the carcass into a hot pan of butter and garlic.

[touchingcloth]

How deep is your crevice mate?

[ZoyzaSorris]

A+ post. Really wish karma was still a valid form of CaB expression.
Frogs have supernatural powers of regeneration and it is a little known fact they can rapidly recover from having all of their content pulped, so grab away.
(actually they irreperably shatter like a slug full of matchsticks so don't do this)

[PlanktonSideburns]

How deep is your crevice mate?

Beegees consider frog

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

Beegees consider frog

Beaten to it by literally seconds :(

( I wish Plank-O would stop giving me sad face recourse reasons.)

[Captain Z]

One of the very first pieces of information I remember absorbing[nb]28[/nb] was that you shouldn't pick up a frog with your bare hands because of something to do with the heat? May be apochryphal.

Couldn't you build them a ramp?

[flotemysost]

It's raining frogs, hallelujah, it's raining frogs, every specimen
Poison arrow, tree and green
Rough and tough amphibians

Answer is yes, it was a necessity when my cats used to bring them in after they went a-hunting in damp weather. But I hated it. Worst part is when they scream, it's awful.

[idunnosomename]

you mean these guys?



i had a pond in the garden as a kid and used to pick up the frogs we had all the time. you have to approach them gently but they oddly will trust you if you are patient. I remember their little hearts beating too fast if you were too pushy, also they would piss (negligible amounts) on you as they hopped away. but i could hold them in my hand and stroke them and they were obliging.

just in case you're picturing me as Ren the Chihuahua in that gross episode of adult party cartoon, i did have massive anxiety that might ever tread on one and hurt one. thankfully i never did (accidentally crunching snails is bad enough). although we did have a cold snap once that froze a load of them in the pond once. there was one I recognised with a wonky leg floating in the pond. my dead pet moment.

anyway they might be the fast food of the british ecosystem but freeing them is a noble thing to do. although scooping them out of a crevice with your bare hands might be easier said than done and your current tactic might not be so bad.

[pancreas]

frog nonce

[touchingcloth]

It's raining frogs, hallelujah, it's raining frogs, every specimen
Poison arrow, tree and green
Rough and tough amphibians

Answer is yes, it was a necessity when my cats used to bring them in after they went a-hunting in damp weather. But I hated it. Worst part is when they scream, it's awful.

[touchingcloth]

I remember their little hearts beating too fast if you were too pushy

Doo doo doo doo doo

also they would piss (negligible amounts) on you as they hopped away

The frogs of love are pissing.

[flotemysost]

Looks a bit like one of these close up, I suppose



(Apologies in advance to any ranidophobes - I know someone who used to suffer from this quite badly, though I suppose you probably wouldn't click on a froggy thread in the first place).

[ZoyzaSorris]

I know someone who is scared of frogs too. Must rank amongst the most silly of phobias.  Lovely little pathetic fellas

[touchingcloth]

A+ post. Really wish karma was still a valid form of CaB expression.

Agreed, and tags. The Frogs (2021)

[madhair60]

frog nonce

yeah this

[Catalogue of ills]

I was really into this post until about half way in, and then was overcome by a terrible sense of grenouille

[Cloud]

Tag: French dating thread

[JesusAndYourBush]

I Penguined a cup of coffee again the other day.  If I'd p-p-p picked up a frog by mistake it'd have been a traumatic ecoetience for both of us.
And while reading the start of this thread I was thinking 'why not just pick it up' before even getting to that part.

[idunnosomename]

turned the freakin frogs gay

[bgmnts]

I feel like waiting patiently and letting it go into the tub as you are doing is less stressful to the frogs than plunging your paw into your crevice and grabbing them.

[Brian Freeze]

Aren't you supposed to do it with wet hands to avoid fucking with their mucus layer?

[Ferris]

When I lived near a park I got very good at picking up hedgehogs and releasing them from the pots near the front of our student house. I once did this in front of a girl and impressed her, so there is value in it. Grab the frog (but don't squish it) and demonstrate your firm hands to the glazing woman and you'd have walked into 10-20% off your quote guaranteed.

Re: frogs, my chickens used to eat them. Make of that what you will, though I'd happily pick them up with my hands. Why not? I don't understand the apprehension, though I suppose I'm the suburban equivalent of a horny-handed son of the soil(/concrete).

Edit: actually, I took the nipper to an urban farm thing and a few goats got a bit wise with the gate and tried to make a break for it and muggins was the only one willing to roll up sleeves and push the cunts back into their enclosure. Managed to catch a chicken and delight a party of small children who hadn't seen one up close because the other parents were going "ooh not sure" about picking one up. I reckon you can be a bit too precious about touching animals - give them a poke there, go on they'll be alright.

[GoblinAhFuckScary]

thee oh sees consider rewrite

[first skeleton on mars]

give them a little kiss before you set them free, you never know

could you cover your crevice with some kind of screen or wire mesh?

[ProvanFan]

I once saw an evil cunt boy jump on a frog. It burst open with a very loud bang, guts all over the road. I'd been cruel to some insects in my time but I'd never seen anything like this, haunted me for ages. The perpetrator died in his teens. It was reported as a heart issue but I reckon frogs did it.

[checkoutgirl]

How deep is your crevice mate?

Ben Dover and Phil McCrevice.

[idunnosomename]

I once saw an evil cunt boy jump on a frog. It burst open with a very loud bang, guts all over the road. I'd been cruel to some insects in my time but I'd never seen anything like this, haunted me for ages. The perpetrator died in his teens. It was reported as a heart issue but I reckon frogs did it.

glad to hear the cunt is dead. almost certainly would've grown up to be a serial killer

[touchingcloth]

Aren't you supposed to do it with wet hands to avoid fucking with their mucus layer?

Almost, you're supposed to sneeze into your hands first.