RUMFORD - Just as male peepers in Southern Maine are beginning to call out for mates, Maine Audubon is also trying to attract attention to itself.

The Falmouth branch of Maine Audubon is seeking volunteers statewide to listen for and note the sounds of frogs on several evenings from now through early summer. It's part of a nationwide "citizen-science" survey.

"After heavy snow cover and a cold spring delayed the season by two weeks, wood frogs and spring peepers are finally starting to call along the coast of Maine as far north as Acadia National Park," Maine Audubon wildlife biologist Susan Gallo said in a report Thursday.

"When we get a night of warm rain, then frogs and salamanders will really start coming to life."

Gallo coordinates the Maine Amphibian Monitoring Project, which is entering its 12th year of surveying Maine's amphibian populations.

Volunteers are needed to conduct two-hour roadside surveys in Southern and Western Maine (North Lebanon, South Parsonsfield and Kennebago), Central Maine (Madison and Greenfield), Down East (Tunk Lake, Corea and Ellsworth), Northern Maine (Caucomgomoc Lake, Moose Mountain, Penobscot Lake and Pittston), and Aroostook County (Dickey, Musquacook Lake, Oakfield/Stair Falls, St. John, Bootford, Chapman, Bridgewater, and Patten).

Typically, volunteers have e-mail and Internet access and can commit three years to the project.

After passing an online quiz on frog calls, they conduct surveys in early spring to hear spring peepers and wood frogs, then in late spring to hear American toads and northern leopard and pickerel frogs. In early summer, it's gray tree, green, mink and bullfrogs.

Volunteers make 10 stops along their routes, waiting five minutes at each and noting the frog species heard.

Gallo said Maine has nine species of amphibians, but usually only a few are heard at any one time. This makes identification relatively easy for beginners. Volunteers and the public can take the U.S. Geological Survey's frog quiz at www.pwrc.usgs.gov/frogquiz.

Those interested in participating should contact Gallo at 781-2330, ext. 216, or sgallo@maineaudubon.org.

The Maine Amphibian Monitoring Project was launched in 1997 by Maine Audubon and the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife to assess amphibians across Maine and nationwide. The Geological Survey is coordinating the nationwide effort.