A life cycle refers to all the stages that animals go through with reference to their growth. Life cycles keep on repeating for reproduction as well. There are many animals in this world and all experience different kinds of life cycles. No two animals have the same life cycle.

Animals like beetles, frogs, and butterflies go through a process called metamorphosis. Metamorphosis is a word for transforming from one form to another. The animals that go through this process look very different as babies than when they grow up as adults.

Frogs are amphibians that can survive both on land and on water. But during their life cycle of becoming an adult frog from an infant frog, they go through numerous changes. And for all those stages, they live only in water.

Stage 1- Egg

A female frog lays many eggs at one time in a pond. Those eggs float on the water either in a jelly mass or a cluster. Those eggs hatch into tadpoles very soon.

Stage 2- Tadpole

When the tadpole hatches from the egg, it looks more like a fish than a frog. Initially, it doesn’t have any legs. It has gills instead of lungs to breathe underwater. The tadpole swims, eats plants, and algae in the water, and starts growing. The growth continues for various weeks. It is this time only when the tadpole starts to grow lungs so that when it becomes a frog, it is able to breathe on land as well. It has a long tail. The two hind also start to grow in this time, so it can leap around apart from swimming.

Stage 3- Young Frog

The tadpole grows its two front legs and its tail becomes shorter. Its tail contains many nutrients so it doesn’t have to look for food outside anywhere. The tadpole now becomes a little frog. It jumps out from the water and reaches the land. The frog is still very tiny.

Stage 4- Adult Frog

In this stage, the frog’s tail is completely gone and it starts eating insects instead of plants. This young frog takes 2-4 more years to become an adult.

This is the life cycle of a frog.