Rest in Peace

Yesterday, Bill and I cleaned out the frog aquarium as we've done dozens of times before.  We did nothing different than usual, and nothing was out of the ordinary.  I was excited to put my baby Jeremiah (who's really not a baby anymore!) into the big tank with the girls, since he was definitely outgrowing his little tank.

Shortly thereafter, we made a spontaneous trip to Columbus for a little shopping and to visit a friend.  When we arrived home around 11:30pm, I went to feed the frogs... I noticed one was upside down on the bottom (Isosceles) and got a little concerned.  I called Bill over to help get her out (I just can't stand doing that sort of thing!) and I noticed the other frogs were acting strange... Sigma, who's nearly always hanging out at the surface, was sitting at Pi's feet.  Bill poked those two with the net, and then the rest... and they were all gone.

We don't know what caused this, except it had to be something with the water change.  But since we didn't do anything different than what we've done dozens of times before, it's really puzzling!

I don't know that I'll ever forget the scene in the tank last night... Sigma at Pi's feet, Jeremiah poking his head out of the rock thing, Isosceles on her back, Diophantine standing looking out the front of the tank, and Square and Integral sitting next to each other nearly holding hands... I felt so bad for all of them!

We gave them a proper burial today, ironically in a box that I last received frog food in.  They're in the back yard near the shed, and a yellow rose bush is now planted above them.

I've definitely had trouble not crying since last night, so in honor of my dearly departed frogs, here's what I'll call their obituaries...

Pi (January 2001 - August 2008)

No pun intended here, but Pi has been a constant in my life for the last 7 1/2 years.  She was the frog who arrived in my ONU school mailbox in early January 2001, and because I got sick that's where she stayed for 2 whole days before I got her!  I had her for the rest of college, and she's moved with us to our Toledo apartment, Toledo house, and now Findlay.  She was my first baby frog, and she's lived with nearly every other frog I've ever had!  She's never been a very social frog, but always content to just hang out and do her own thing.  Pi always loved the "froggie treadmill" - swimming into the current of the filters but not getting anywhere, just like a treadmill.

Sigma (March 2003 - August 2008)

Sigma was my surprise frog.  Senior year of college, after I lost Fourier (the frog who went mental), I requested a new one from the company.  But since that happened in late January and they don't ship frogs if the temperature in your area is colder than 45-50 (which it typically is in January in Ohio!), they wait until it warms up.  So one of the first warm-ish days that spring, I got a notice in my school mailbox that there was a package at the post office for me to pick up... and there was Sigma!  I kept her in the baby tank for a while since she was so much smaller than my other frogs at the time, but as soon as she got in the big tank after moving to Toledo, she grew rapidly and quickly overtook everyone else!  In recent months she's slimmed down quite a bit, even though I know she was eating.  Sigma was my most social frog, and she was always ready to play with my fingers and be petted.  She especially loved feeding time and eating either out of my fingers or off the little frog food spoon.

Integral (April 2003 - August 2008)
I got Integral, along with her late sister Derivative (April 2003 - August 2004) as companions for my little Sigma.  At the time, I had bigger frogs Pi, Cosine, and Laplace in my 5-gallon aquarium, so lonely Sigma in the baby tank got Integral and Derivative to play with.  Integral has been occasionally social, though she prefers to just chill out.  Ever since she hit her growth spurt once we got the 55-gallon tank, she's always been one of my biggest frogs and was perfectly content just sitting around, except during meal times!  She always loved her food and made sure she was one of the first to eat.

Square (June 2003 - August 2008)
Square was my other very social frog, and she too loved to be played with and petted.  Received as a college graduation present from a friend along with her late brother, Root (June 2003 - May 2007), she's been with us since the Toledo apartment.  She rapidly grew into one of my biggest frogs, but she still loved to play.  Her favorite game was biting Sigma's toes when she felt Sigma was getting too much attention.  She also loved to chase Sigma around the tank.


Isosceles (July 2003 - August 2008)
Isosceles was adopted so that I'd have an even number of frogs - 8 at the time.  She was an oddball in some respects, since most of the other frogs had a counterpart so to speak - Square and Root, Derivative and Integral, Pi and Cosine (Sine departed in May 2002; Cosine lasted until May 2007).  I didn't have a name picked out ahead of time for her as I usually did, so I looked to my blog at the time for a name.  Isosceles was named by my Grandpa, and the name fit her well.  Her recognizable pattern was two identical smile-shaped markings on her back (hard to see from the picture's angle) - kinda like two identical sides of an isosceles triangle.  Never one to be social, she preferred to hide under things - the filters, a rock formation, other frogs, whatever.  She never caused trouble, never annoyed her fellow frogs, and was happy to live under a rock.


Diophantine (March 2004 - August 2008)
Diophantine (nicknamed Di) was adopted with her late brother Ackermann (March 2004 - May 2007) shortly after we moved in to our Toledo house.  I was in grad school at the University of Toledo at the time, taking a digital controls class - hence the names.  The Diophantine Equation was commonly used to solve complex control systems, as was the Ackermann function.  Once we had moved into the house and I had my own office, I wanted baby frogs to keep back there, since the big frog tank was in the dining room, so that's where Di and Acker came in.  They did eventually move into the big tank when they outgrew the smaller one, and the other frogs accepted them well.  Di in particular liked to hang out with Isosceles - usually under a rock!  She wasn't very social, but she was always curious and liked to look at passers by.

Jeremiah (May 2007 - August 2008)
Jeremiah was my "baby frog" and the only one with a non-mathematical name.  After I lost my 3 boy frogs on Mother's Day weekend 2007 (Cosine, Root, and Ackermann), the frog company accidentally sent my sister-in-law 2 baby frogs!  She hadn't requested them and already had enough frogs of her own, so I adopted them.  They became Newton (May 2007 - August 2007) and Jeremiah, after an email naming contest.  My cousin Michael named Newton (after Isaac Newton), but unfortunately at just a few months old, little Newton became a little too curious and climbed inside the rock thing and couldn't get out.  My aunt Debbie named Jeremiah, after the song Joy to the World - you know, "Jeremiah was a bull frog."  I figured since I was getting ready for seminary, that would be an appropriate name.  Since he was so much smaller than the "big girls" and I was a bit paranoid after their 3 brothers died all in one weekend, he lived in a small tank next to the big one.  He was finally outgrowing his tank, however, and yesterday was the first day he got to experience life in the big tank, albeit rather briefly.

~~~~~

I'm definitely still shocked at the loss of all of my frogs so suddenly like this, so I don't know if I'll "start over" or not.  Frogs have been such a big part of my life for over 7 1/2 years now (more than 1/4 of my life!) that it's hard to imagine life without them.  Every day for 7 1/2 years I've fed frogs twice a day, except for when we've been out of town, and then we've introduced some of our friends to the joys of feeding our frogs (for those of you who don't know, no there are no flies - they eat little pellets that smell like fish food).

Even though Bill has never really grown attached to them (and couldn't identify who was who) I've grown to love frogs dearly, and everyone who's ever given me a gift relating to frogs definitely knows that.  I know it will never be possible to truly replace those I've lost, but I may give it another go... after all, I think life would be lonelier without frogs in the house.  Plus we have the big aquarium and filters, and if we didn't use it then I don't know what we'd put on our buffet in the dining room!  What do normal people put on those things anyway?

Please leave a comment and let me know your thoughts... to frog again, or not to frog?