06/2/11

Harnessing the Power of Social Media to Help Frogs and Other Amphibians

I imagine in the early days of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg was not thinking about how his innovative new social networking site might help wildlife. But being globally connected by social media can speed the spread of information and help in conservation efforts.

Because up to one-third of all amphibians are endangered and many species are on the brink of extinction, it makes sense to take advantage of the incredible power of social media to help amphibian conservation efforts in an efficient and cost-effective way.

We’ve recently learned about a new project called The Global Amphibian Blitz , an on-line information sharing hub for non-professional naturalists and biologists to track and record sightings of amphibians around the world.  This information will then help professional researchers to document and determine where conservation efforts are most needed. It also seems to be a great way for those who care about frogs and other amphibians to connect with each other.

 If you’re an amateur herpetologist, please consider becoming a part of the Global Amphibian Blitz. The YouTube video below explains how to participate in the project:

The Global Amphibian Blitz partners are Amphibia Web, Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, Center for Biological Diversity, Amphibian Ark, Neotropical Conservation. and iNaturalist.org.

05/13/11

Creating a Wildlife- and Eco-friendly Backyard

Each spring at Frogs Are Green, we try to encourage people to create backyards (or gardens, if you’re English) that are friendly to wildlife and the environment, water-wise, and easy to maintain without using herbicides and pesticides.

Imitate Nature

It is possible to create a wildlife friendly garden without using pesticides and herbicides, but you’ll need to mimic nature a bit and do some detective work to find out what types of plants and flowers flourish in your area. Sometimes you don’t even need to plant these natives—they may migrate to your backyard, and if you like them, you can find a place for them. This happened with me—a native fern migrated over to my yard and it is quite beautiful. Over the years, the ferns have spread and make a nice ground cover. That doesn’t mean you need to restrict yourself to native plants. My New Guinea impatiens obviously are not native to New Jersey, but I definitely try to fit in a number of low-maintenance native plants.

In my first years of gardening, I had to water my backyard every day with a hose to keep it alive. Now with a backyard filled with lots of native plants, I only water the potted plants.

Survival of the Fittest

After several years, I’ve realized that I can’t plant hostas—they’re like candy to slugs. Rather than spend money and effort, and possibly introduce toxins to the soil, to get rid of the slugs, I now keep the hostas in pots, above the ground, and then periodically lift the pots to check for any slugs. (Yes, I tried the tuna can full of beer method to get rid of slugs, but they didn’t fall for that trick.)

Since I don’t have much sun in my urban backyard, I don’t plant sun-loving annuals anymore. These flowers didn’t flourish and so seemed to attract disease and bugs. Have you tried some flowers that didn’t quite make it, or if they did, required a lot of watering or pesticides to maintain them? You may have found that other plants just seem to do great year after year without much attention. In my garden, potted geraniums seem to do well, lasting all the way through until frost, even without a lot of sun or attention. Even though they’re not the most exotic flowers, I have lots of them in interesting colors.

Courtesy of Sierra Club (New York)

KEEP THE ANIMALS HAPPY

I put out seed for the birds, although around this time of year in late spring, I start to cut down on bird seed. I put out water for them in a bird bath as well, and I sometimes also notice bees dipping into the bird bath. Because I don’t use herbicides or pesticides, I am not unintentionally killing off good insects—bees, lady bugs, etc. or potentially harming other animals like songbirds.

Build a Frog Pond

We don’t have any amphibians in my city (that I know of), but if you have amphibians in your area, put out a toad abode to keep these local insect-eating amphibians happy.

It’s also possible to create a frog pond relatively easily without a huge expense or effort. My sister put in a frog pond by her house in Connecticut, and on one summer day, she counted eighteen frogs enjoying her pond, including one frog who jumped up and sat right beside her on the garden bench. Here’s how she did it:

She dug out a base that was 4 feet by 7 feet, about 2 feet deep. On each corner, she created a shelf, 1 foot deep, for aquatic plants.

She bought pond liner from a garden center, a piece larger than the pond (so it was 12 feet long by 9 feet wide) and put stones down to hold it in place. She also piled smaller stones in one corner that came just above the water as a ramp for the frogs to get in and out of the pond.

She also added water flowers with leaves and lily pads. These plants act as filters for the pond (and, of course, our froggy friends like to sit on them).

She put in a pump to circulate the water (with an outdoor extension cord buried in ground to house).

She notes that the pond should be cleaned out every year. Take out the water, but be careful if there are frogs eggs in the pond. Put the eggs in a clean bowl with pond water before putting back in the pond. Also, she did not add the frogs to the pond—they migrated to her pond from another small pond on her property. Don’t introduce non-native frogs to your pond as they could disrupt the local ecology and introduce disease to native frogs

Please send us your ideas for creating a natural backyard and if you have some pictures, send them along and we’ll add them to our backyard gallery (see the photo gallery in our sidebar to the right).

Here is more information about your having your backyard certified as a Wildlife Habitat by the National Wildlife Federation.

05/4/11

Another Fairy Tale Wedding

On the morning of the April 29, I got up at dawn to watch the Royal Wedding. Because it was also the 3rd Annual Save the Frogs day, my mind was full of frogs, too. So frogs, princes, frog princes, and fairy tales were all mixed up in my mind. I was trying to find a connection between these two events. True, the groom’s father, Prince Charles, is the main spokesman for the Prince’s Rainforest Project, which has a frog as its mascot, but…

Yesterday I came across a story in the Dorset (England) Echo that tied these two events together. It turns out Will and Kate weren’t the only couple married in England on April 29. Another couple, Sabrina Laben and Simon Pittman, also tied the knot. They did not (I don’t think) arrive at the church in a Rolls-Royce, probably didn’t have a trumpet fanfare, and definitely didn’t have a billion people watching their ceremony.

Instead, they created a Save the Frogs wedding. Sabrina loves frogs and in lieu of gifts, she requested that donations be made to Save the Frogs. A “frog and frogette” stood on top of the wedding cake instead of traditional bride and groom figurines, and they sent out frog-decorated invitations. They had their reception Abbotsbury Subtropical Gardens, noted for its idyllic setting and multiple ponds.

courtesy of weddingandcakes.com

The more I thought about it, the better I liked this idea of an amphibian-themed wedding. In many cultures, frogs are symbols of good luck, prosperity, and fertility. They are associated with fairy tales and happy endings and transformations (the frog turning into a prince). As Susan and I know, people seem to love giving frog-related gifts. And what better place for a wedding than near a beautiful pond? If it rains, even better—frogs love rain and you might have a frog chorus accompaniment to your wedding!

For more information about other events that occurred on Save the Frogs day, and about the organization’s ongoing efforts and activities, please click here

01/20/11

Rediscovering Haiti's Lost Frogs

Haiti recently marked the anniversary of the January 12, 2010, earthquake that devastated the country, killing over 300,000 people, and leaving almost a million people homeless.

Recently scientists from Conservation International (CI) and the Amphibian Specialist Group (ASG) of IUCN reported a bit of news they hope might become a source of pride and hope for the country’s environmental future: the surprising re-discovery of six species of  frogs in the country’s severely degraded tropical forests, species that had been lost to science for nearly two decades.

Large-scale deforestation has left the country with less than two-percent of its original forest cover and has degraded most of the fresh water ecosystems. Yet Haitians depend on the cloud forests of the southwest mountains as two of the last remaining pockets of environmental health and natural wealth in Haiti.

This expedition was part of Conservation International’s global Search for Lost Frogs campaign, in which CI’s Amphibian Conservation Specialist Dr. Robin Moore, in partnership with Dr. Blair Hedges of Pennsylvania State University, searched for the La Selle Grass frog (E. glanduliferoides), which had not been seen in more than 25 years. They also hoped to assess the status of Haiti’s 48 other native species of amphibians.

The scientists did not find the La Selle Grass frog, but to their surprise, they rediscovered several other remarkable frog species, most of which haven’t been seen since 1991. As Dr. Moore says, “We went in looking for one missing species and found a treasure trove of others. That, to me, represents a welcome dose of resilience and hope for the people and wildlife of Haiti.”

Dr. Moore says that a common assumption about Haiti is that there isn’t anything left to save. Yet this is not true. According to Moore, there are biologically rich pockets intact, despite tremendous environmental pressures. Haiti now has the opportunity to design their reconstruction plans around these pockets, and to protect them, so that these natural areas can more effectively act as buffers to climate change and natural disasters. However, there is little time to waste: 92 percent of Haiti’s amphibian populations are listed as threatened and are in danger of disappearing.

“The biodiversity of Haiti, including its frogs, is approaching a mass extinction event caused by massive and nearly complete deforestation. Unless the global community comes up with a solution soon, we will lose many unique species forever,” said Dr. Hedges.

Amid the backdrop of Haiti’s struggle to rebuild, Moore added some important context:

The devastation that the people of Haiti are still coping with is almost unimaginable. I have never seen anything like it. Clearly, the health of Haiti’s frogs is not anyone’s primary concern here. However, the ecosystems these frogs inhabit, and their ability to support life, is critically important to the long-term well-being of Haiti’s people, who depend on healthy forests for their livelihoods, food security, and fresh water. Amphibians are what we call barometer species of our planet’s health. They’re like the canaries in the coal mine. As they disappear, so too do the natural resources people depend upon to survive.

Here are a few of the rediscovered frogs:

Hispaniolan Ventriloquial Frog (Eleutherodactylus dolomedes). This frog is named after its call that the frog projects like a ventriloquist. Its unusual call consists of a rapid seven-note series of chirps, with the initial four notes rising slowly in pitch before plateauing; the call is released in widely-spaced intervals, often minutes apart. Prior to this expedition, the species was only known from a few individuals.

Mozart’s Frog (E. amadeus). Called Mozart’s frog because when Dr. Hedges, who discovered the species, made an audiospectrogram of the call, it coincidentally resembled musical notes. Its call is a four-note muffled whistle at night; usually given as a shorter two-note call at dawn and dusk.

La Hotte Glanded Frog (E. glandulifer). This frog could be called Old Blue Eyes: its most distinctive feature are its striking blue sapphire-colored eyes – a highly unusual trait among amphibians.

La Hotte Glanded Frog, Eleutherodactylus glandulifer. Copyright Claudio Contreras /iLCP.

Macaya Breast-spot frog. (E. thorectes). Approximately the size of a grape, this is one of the smallest frogs in the world. In Haiti, this species has a very restricted range, occurring only on the peaks of Formon and Macaya at high elevations on the Massif de la Hotte.

Juvenile Macaya breast-spot landfrog, E. thorectes. Photo copyright Robin Moore/iLCP

Hispaniolan Crowned Frog. This species was named after a row of protuberances that resemble a crown on the back of its head. Prior to this expedition, the species was known from less than 10 individuals, and is likely to be extremely rare. It is an arboreal species, occurring in high-elevation cloud forest. Males call from bromeliads or orchids, which they seem to require for reproduction.

Macaya Burrowing Frog. Haiti is now the only place where two burrowing frogs are known to share the same habitat. This species has big jet black eyes and bright orange flashes on the legs. Males call from shallow, underground chambers and eggs are also laid underground, where they hatch directly into froglets.

For more information, please visit Conservation International’s site, which includes more photos, recordings of the frogs’ calls, and a video.

12/23/10

Give a last minute gift to a frog!

Your presents are almost wrapped, you’re nibbling on Christmas cookies, you’re ready for the holidays, but how about giving a small present to our frog friends? Consider donating to the Panama Amphibian Rescue Conservation Project, which works to provide a safe haven for frogs.

  • Text FROG to 20222 to give $5 to the project (message and data rates apply).  This campaign will be winding down soon, so be sure to hop to it now!

Now that winter is officially here, it’s a good time for armchair travels and adventures. Plan a trip to Panama to volunteer for the project. You’ll play a pivotal role in saving amphibians and have the experience of a lifetime.

Happy Holidays from Susan and Mary Jo at

FROGS ARE GREEN!

12/4/10

Burned Forests Threaten the Frogs of Madagascar – Guest Post, Franco Andreone

We are so pleased that Franco Andreone, Associate Curator of Zoology, Responsible for Herpetological and Ichthyological Collections, Museo Regionale di Scienze Naturali, Torino, Italy, offered to write a guest post for Frogs Are Green about his recent visit to Madagascar and what he encountered there—the possible extinction of  frogs species due to the destruction of its forests.

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In October, I visited the Ankaratra, a massif next to Madagascar’s capital Antananarivo, for a quick trip in an attempt to see two of the most threatened (maybe “the most threatened”) frog species of Madagascar: Boophis williamsii and Mantidactylus pauliani.

They are both CR species and live in an area that is not yet protected and has been heavily altered. For some time, on behalf of the Amphibian Specialist Group (ASG), we have advocated the need for protecting this area. To this end, a project has been set up with the help of Conservation International and the collaboration of many colleagues, with the aim of securing the area, which is also very important because it is a draining basin for potable water for the city of Ambatolampy. Through the ASG it was also possible to get a MacArthur grant that will be helpful for any further action.

Some people, notably from the Langaha Association and Madagasikara Voakajy, have begun work on the species, along with other herp species (i.e. Furcifer campani); they have collected data on both B. williamsii and M. pauliani. The two species appear VERY localised, with no more than three spots where they have been found. M. pauliani appeared a little bit more common, but we observed less than ten B. williamsii individuals.

I was already concerned about the threats to these species and their habitat. The bad news is that during the rapid survey we did (a few hours visit), we noticed that almost ALL the exotic forest was burned. This forest, composed mainly of pines, assured a certain naturalness to the area, and prevented erosion. Now, following the voluntary burning events of last July, almost all the forest has been “transformed” into charcoal. This will have serious and terrible consequences for the human populations, especially for the availability of drinking water. Most likely, during the next rainy season there will be accelerated erosion and the water will become heavily polluted. Clearly the amphibian populations will be tragically affected as well. Although one of the sites is still within a small parcel of “natural” forest, the burned trees are all around, and at the other sites the fire event has destroyed the small residual (ferns, grass) vegetation that likely assured the survival of the species.

During the visit we found some B. williamsii, but we really wonder what the effect of the next rains will be. The tadpoles need clear and clean water, and if the water is polluted by erosion, they will most likely die.

Furthermore, there really is a risk that the species will be driven to extinction within a short time.

Boophis williamsii courtesy of Franco Andreone

Boophis williamsii tadpole courtesy of Franco Andreone

Habitat Ankaratra courtesy of Franco Andreone

Mantidactylus pauliani courtesy of Franco Andreone

For more information, please visit my website:  www.francoandreone.it