Planting Pitfalls

We have approximately 4200 holes in our vineyard and this is frog migration time. We did not know this until my husband found frogs in our holes while he worked ahead of the planting crew, cleaning out the fallen soil. On the first day, he saw as many as 8 frogs that had fallen into the plant pit. Of course, he stopped to rescue these frogs. The frog shown on the left is a tree frog. The identifying markings are the bright yellow flash patches on the rear of its thighs. He also asked if anyone saw a frog in the hole, to please "catch and release" the frogs before planting the grapevine.
Many of us were just focussed on planting the vine and not in the mode of frog rescue, so unfortunately, some of the frogs may have unwittingly become part of the circle of life as frog fertilizer. I'm sure those grapevines will be the strong and fast growing ones.
On Sunday, toward the end of one of the rows that we were planting, my husband saw this salamander. The photo was captured by one of our young planters on his iPhone. There are 12 native species of salamander in Connecticut. My husband thinks that it is the marbled salamander according to the DEEP Salamanders of Connecticut information.

We are rapidly filling the holes with plants so hopefully, none of the amphibian wildlife in our vineyard will become fertilizer, but today, we did see a mother mouse and her three young offspring in one of the holes. They were rescued and set free so that some hawk or falcon could have a tasty morsel.