Over the spring we have had tree frogs all over the sides and cover of the pool. When we took off the cover there was one in the wall inside and dh said it would find its way out. I don't think it did. Today I went to check levels for the first time and there was something in the skimmer basket. I thought wth is that and reached in and OMG. I just about yakked. There were 5 frogs in there, all swollen and gross. My husband isn't home and I didn't want my kids to see it so I got a coat hanger and pulled the basket out. Then I promptly put 3 jugs of bleach in the pool (I hadn't added anything to it yet and wasn't going to until I checked CYA but I can't stomach the thought of frog germs circulating in the pool-I read that they can carry salmonella) and turned on the pump/filter. So is this enough to not worry about if the water splashes in my face or something while I'm doing the checking? And for when the kids finally get in the pool when we get it all opened up? I admit I'm a germaphobe and easily freaked out.

You'll live!

thanks. I have no doubt we'll live but I'd like to avoid anyone getting sick.

The chlorine should take care of anything nasty in the water. You could bring it to shock level and do an overnight test to be sure. The bulk pool water should be o.k., but to be safe you can wash off any splashes with soap and water.

thanks. I'll have to look up the overnight test-I don't remember exactly how to do that. I suppose there are worse things in the pool all summer (bird poo, etc) but just seeing those bloated frogs just about did me in. Washing splashes is one thing. Immersing my kids in the pool later is another. So I want to make sure all ickies are dead before I do that.

Critter skimmer is your friend:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003G30FJE

My 3 jugs of bleach brought my FC to 11.5 (CYA is 40) so I added another jug to get to 16. I feel much better now and after reading about how just about everyone finds frogs in their pool, dead or alive. I will be checking the skimmer basket every time I go out to check on my critters though (chickens and rabbits, not frogs)

thanks for the critter skimmer info. Our skimmer cover isn't any of the sizes they show at amazon so I'll check and see if they have other sizes of them at the website.

i had two liquified corpses of chipmunks when i opened the pool this year. bleach and couple of days and it was all gone ...

I have found chipmunks, toads, mice and a snake in my pool and in the skimmers both alive and dead. Never saw any drop in FC.

I've found two dead baby mice that died over night, rescued one almost dead chipmunk, apparently drowned a mouse that was living in my vaccum hose and a million newts. I don't like surprises and dead things, so I almost had a few nervous break downs. LOL I bleach my hands after touching the skimmer with dead things in it. I'm a germophobe too!

Same here. It's not necessary to shock after finding a small dead animal. If it hasn't been there long (still solid) then it's no problem whatsoever. If it's liquified I wouldn't swim for a few hours; not because it's unsafe, it's just gross. As long as you have sufficient FC, nothing bad will happen.

In the past 3 weeks, I've cleared out 6 mice, 2 from the pool itself and 4 from skimmer baskets. My hunch is that the ones in the pool, which were huge, were dropped by birds.

Just today, I cleared out 12 frogs from 2 skimmer baskets. Heck, I cleaned out my baskets and, less than an hour later, I had another frog in the skimmer. I haven't noticed a real drop in FC, but it sure is frustrating/gross to deal with it. I imagine that the forest scavengers are grateful though. They get good meals out of this.