Kathie Klein age 9  of San Francisco, Ca for her question:

What are polliwog?

The polliwog got his name from two old English words. One meant head and the other meant wiggle. And a polliwog is just that ‑ all head and wiggle. He is a sooty little tadpole  a junior frog.

Spring is the season for polliwogs and many sensible young people go out polliwog hunting. The hunting grounds are in the nearby streams and ponds take along rubbers to avoid wet feet. The only other thing you need is a glass jar.

The polliwogs are captured in the egg state. The eggs. of course were laid by frogs or toads. Toads often lay their eggs in strings of jelly. Since toad polliwogs usually take a long time to grow up we will search on for frog eggs. We shall find them in big blobs of floating jelly near the water’s edge. The jelly is spotted with small round jet‑black dots.

Scoop up the frog eggs into your jar and fill in some water from the pond or stream. Add a few bits of waterweed. You now own one of the most wonderful aquariums in the world. Great magic will happen there in the next few weeks. Have your magnifying glass ready to watch it.

In a few days  the little black dots are not so round. They seem to be uncoiling into comma shapes. Actually the baby polliwogs are forming in the jelly food. Eight days after they are laid the little polliwogs hatch. At first they are helpless without eyes or mouth. All they can do is to hang onto the old jelly or a waterweed with tiny suckers.

The inky fellows develop fast. Watch them grow and change through your magnifying glass. Those fringes around their necks are breathing gills. Eyes and mouth appear in a few days. The polliwogs begin to eat tiny bits of plants and whatever else they find in the water„ They are now true polliwogs ‑ all head and wiggly tail.

Soon the gill fringes disappear. New gills are growing inside when this is done watch for the back legs to appear. With their two new back legs. the polliwogs legs. The polliwogs become teenagers. Meantime the front legs are growing under the skin where you cannot see them. When ready  they pop out one at a time. The next changes are harder to see. The polliwogs are growing lungs. Every now and then they come up for a gulp of air. During these changes they may go off their food don’t worry  they are living on the food stored in their tails. The trails waste away and disappear.

Now you have a batch of miniature frogs. The time has come when they need a larger home. They need to enjoy life on land and in the water. Chances are= you will want to return all or most of them to their native pond or stream and set them free.

These weze lucky polliwogs. Without your helps only one or two of them would have grown up. Some w6uld have been devoured as they clung helplessly after hatching. Others would have been gobbled up by their enemies as they started polliwogging in the water.. The polliwogs you helped to live.. however will grow up to‑help keep down the pesky fly population.