Thrillist, an online media company that bills itself as “a leading men’s digital lifestyle brand, providing all that’s new, unknown or underappreciated” has some advice for the aspiring trendy young millennial male. They suggest he “seize every opportunity to casually drop the word pinkletink.”

The term pinkletink was recognized by Thrilllist as one of the best regional slang words from around the country. Who knew that Islanders were at the cutting edge of cool?

Pinkletinks are spring peepers, those little frogs with big voices that herald the arrival of spring on our little Island, no matter what the calendar says. Last week they were heard (and their activity celebrated) Island-wide.

Use of their peculiar nickname is highly localized, since only Islanders employ the word pinkletink to describe this diminutive frog. Henry Beetle Hough, in his book Singing in the Morning and other Essays on Martha’s Vineyard, explained “Someone says that the frogs are going at it on Cape Cod, and that ‘many natives call them pinkwinks’ . . . Over here on the Vineyard what we have is pinkletinks, and they are Hyla crucifer, tree toad now and forever.”

Now and forever may be true for the word pinkletink, but since Hough’s 1951 proclamation, their scientific name has changed to Pseudacris crucifer, which translates to cross-bearing false locust and refers to the x-shape on the frog’s back and the similarity of its call to insects. And though ours may be the coolest linguistically speaking, another interesting name for this frog, tinkle toes, comes from New Brunswick.

Pinkletinks mean business when they begin to vocalize. Only the males sing the cricket-like song in their soulful attempt to woo a mate. They can peep an impressive 20 times per minute and chorus together, making an almost deafening noise when you venture near a sizable population. If you listen closely, you may also occasional hear a different trill-like call. This trill is for the boys, since the males use it to defend their tiny territories that range from only four to 16 inches!

Thought they have just become active, it would be a mistake to think that they just arrived. Pinkletinks have been here all winter, dormant behind bark, under logs and beneath leaf litter. Survival of the petite peepers is only possible due to an anti-freeze-like chemical that allows them to survive temperatures below zero degrees Fahrenheit without freezing.

Their species success is also a result of their prolific procreation. Female peepers lay over 1,000 tiny eggs (one millimeter each), and a high percentage of those eggs survive through their tadpole stage and into adulthood.

The sounds of pinkletinks calling fill so many of us with so much joy that it even has me singing a new tune. Butchering a popular 1938 jazz standard, you will find me repeating this chorus:

“Jeepers Creepers, where’d ya get those peepers?

Jeepers Creepers, where’d ya get those frogs?”

Suzan Bellincampi is director of the Felix Neck Wildlife Sanctuary in Edgartown, and author of Martha’s Vineyard: A Field Guide to Island Nature.