How to find Pseudacris crucifer tadpoles - what I have found.

[Bill B]

Yes, breeders are very active in wetlands with lots of stiff emergent vegetation (areas that are usually almost completely free of forest canopy.
I know of several wetlands where they called within the bounds a a few square miles.

The stiff upright vegetation is not necessary, though. Find a woodland pond with lots of leaf litter on the bottom, for example, and enough light to penetrates to that algae grows on the leaves. Some ponds that had peepers showed now signs of tads, and these were ones that were way too dark. The wetlands completely packed with vegeation make it hard to collect them because it is hard to get the net though the 'weeds' and shrubs. Also helpful is that the shoreline has a gradually tapering - you can walk up to the pond, and at the vibration of your feet, tads start squirming around in the leaves. Some ponds I went to that had lots of peeping did not have gradual-enough dropoffs, and I could find nothiing.

This was true of N. Leopard Frog tads in ponds whrere I heard them calling early in the season.