Tadpoles

There have often been tadpoles and great amounts of frogspawn each year so like you say they must be desperate for a place to lay them, there was space in the middle, deeper part of the pond but they didnt seem interested in that part, just the warmer shallower bits where they were all crammed in! Thanks for the input though I'll mention it to my Mum when I see her next.

It does look like that but as this is an urban area there aren't that many people with ponds in their gardens or people with gardens large enough for ponds! its ridiculous though as Sheffield has 5 large rivers and plenty of lakes nearby but the frogs choose to ignore them for some reason, maybe there are too many predators in them?

The pond is quite deep towards the middle but I think that there was a big explosion of frogspawn all in one weekend due to it being so cold until late in the year so maybe they all came at once and all seemed to be fighting for the shallows which seems strange, heres the frogspawn stage: http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/21558237