Leigh Perry, age 9, of Ft. Huachuca, Arizona, for her question:

What do I do when my tadpoles act less?

Every spring, the luckiest young people in the land adopt families of tadpoles. The exciting project begins when you find a jellified gob of frog eggs floating in a pond or a lazy creek. You scoop the marvelous stuff into a jar, along with some of the water, and take it home. Pretty soon the round black dots inside the eggs hatch and a merry family of tadpoles begin to wriggle through the water. In the pond water there are lots of tiny plants too small for your eyes to see. The tadpoles feed on these midget plants. They feel happier if you also remembered to add a few larger plants with their pond water. Soon their front legs and back legs appear and their little black tails disappear. Your foster children look like miniature frogs. They must leave the water and spend part of their lives on the land. The time has come to say goodbye to them. Place them in a box, along with some moist, leafy greenery, and carry them tenderly home  ¬back to their home by the stream or pond where you found their eggs. Open the box and give them their freedom. By the time you have finished saying goodbye, they will have hopped off to enjoy their froggy lives where they belong.