The species that occur on The Nature Reserve have the ultimate connection with Nature. Some of our species are born, live and die here. Others migrate thousands of miles to breed in the Nature Reserve. Some just pass through on their way to somewhere else. All of them use the resources available on the Nature Reserve: food, water and shelter. Our monitoring of species helps us better understand the species-Nature connection. Some connections are intuitive, for example, Arroyo toads need water to breed, therefore you would think that rain is a good thing. However, the amount of rain matters. Too little, breeding can get started but fail. Too much rain changes the hydroperiod of San Juan Creek. In a normal rain year San Juan Creek is ephemeral, i.e., it dries up for several months.  Between the 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 water years, there were only two brief periods in 2023 between October 1 and December 31 when there was no streamflow recorded in San Juan Creek: a 3-day period from November 3-5, and an 8-day period from November 8-15 (USGS 2024). San Juan Creek flowing year round provides the ideal environment for non-native invasive aquatic species such as the African clawed frog, American bullfrog and red swamp crayfish to proliferate. These species depress Arroyo toad breeding. A return to a normal rain year that allows San Juan Creek to dry up will reduce the populations of these species and allow Arroyo toad breeding to increase. So, as the saying goes “pray for rain”, but not too much!