Tadpole Restaurant

One of my fondest childhood monsoon memories is rescuing tadpoles from water puddles that would soon dry up. We released them in our courtyard’s water tank to grow into frogs or toads. We had a marshy and mossy backyard with an overgrowth of mushrooms and ferns. When rain soaked, the mushrooms sprinted high up and the ferns spread over forming a natural green canopy. I’d explore our garden through the matrix of dense fern overgrowth for some hidden mystery or secret which I could never unearth.

Meanwhile, the tadpoles lost their gills and slowly started to develop lungs. Their tails became shorter and their legs grew. Their back legs sprouted first and then their front legs as they graduated from tadpoles to froglets. Finally, they became adult minuscule frogs and hopped out of the tank into the mesh of moss, ferns and mushrooms.

The tadpoles would feed on the algae, the green carpet of moss that carpeted the walls of our tank, bacteria, worms and mosquito larvae. These frisky creatures also like to nourish themselves with tender spinach, broccoli, lettuce, cabbage, cucumber without seeds, etc. Vegetables need to be boiled before serving them.

As the tadpoles grow into frogs, they make a transition from herbivorous to omnivorous to carnivorous. Large ones may even eat fish, shrimp and other tadpoles.

Nowadays being a chef for dogs and cats has transited to a neurotypical profession, so is societally accepted. However, if I say that I cook for tadpoles, I may be ridiculed. This often happens because people lack knowledge and can’t break the brackets of their rigid thinking. The fact that tadpoles, frogs and toads are just as important to the ecosystem as cats and dogs doesn’t occur to their immature minds.

There’s no swamp nearby and the clutter of brick and concrete is clogging the watery places where frogs and toads can lay eggs. So, I see less of them during monsoons. However, we boast that this is civilization while we eat at a restaurant where these delightful creatures had once teemed, take selfies and photographs in designer clothes which we proudly upload on Instagram and gossip vindictively about various people.

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Picture: Pixabay

https://pixabay.com/photos/tadpole-water-drop-leaf-frog-toad-2119594/