Once, while fishing, I found myself in a rather unfamiliar terrain by the river, the first thing I noticed were strange sounds. Something like mating cats in February or crying babies. You know that feeling, you're alone on the water, you just hear the song of birds, the sound of waterfalls. And then suddenly some muffled screams, like from horror movies. No, cat love games can’t be, so May is the month, I thought. And whence the baby in the wild, there is no chance of it being so.
And so I imperceptibly reached the river beach upstream. When there, hundreds of frogs, red tortoises. They mate, change their skin, what do they do ... But they make incredible horror sounds. I later found it on the internet that red European Bombina bombina lat. males have developed resonant vocal sacs and know how to produce all kinds of tones. This frog is slightly toxic even to humans, so they should not be touched, nor should they touch the grass or stones where they are tied. They have a skin changing ritual, where they eat old skin as a meal.
Jednom sam se, pecajući, zatekao na prilično nepoznatom terenu pokraj rijeke, prvo šta sam uočio bili su čudni zvukovi. Nešto slično kao parenje mačaka u februaru ili kao plač beba. Znate onaj osjećaj, sam si na vodi, samo se čuje cvrkut ptica, slapova žubor. I onda odjednom neki prigušeni krikovi, kao iz horor filmova. Ne, mačje ljubavne igre ne mogu biti, pa maj je mjesec, pomislio sam. A otkud beba u divljini, nema šanse da to bude. I tako sam neprimjetno stigao uzvodno rijekom do kamenite plažice. Kad tamo, na stotine žaba, crvenih mukača. Pare se, presvlače kožu, šta li rade... Ali ispuštaju nevjerovatne hororske zvukove. To sam kasnije pronašao na internetu da crveni europski mukač, mužjaci imaju razvijene rezonatorske vokalne kese i znaju proizvoditi svakakve tonove. Ova žaba je blago toksična čak i za ljude, pa ih ne treba dirati, niti dirati travu ili kamenje kuda se one vrzmaju. Imaju ritual presvlačenja kože, gdje staru kožu uslast pojedu kao obrok.
Youtube video credit: Sumazutica.com
Na videu možemo čuti kako se oglašava mukač. Ali iz moje priče su bili agresivniji zvukovi, kao dječji plač. I žabe su bile sitnije.
I have a million frogs when it's their time. But I've never watched because they change color. Somehow I don't like going to watch them.