Frogs play an important role in many ecosystems. They are bio-indicators, which means they indicate the health of their ecosystems with their permeable, porous skin that reacts to biological hazards such as contamination. They also help with insect control as a food source for carnivorous predators and eating smaller creatures. Sadly, frogs around the world […]
Tag: amphibians
We’re Losing Turtles At An Alarming Rate – And That Has Larger Consequences
Given that turtles have been around about 220 million years and even outlasted the dinosaurs, a lot of people assume that we have nothing to worry about when it comes to turtles’ continued longevity. Sadly, that’s not the case. On the contrary, turtles are one of the most vulnerable vertebrate creatures on the planet at […]
POLL: Should Southeast Asian newts be protected under CITES?
A little-known group of amphibians — the Southeast Asian newts — are in high demand as pets, a new study has found. Large numbers of these semi-aquatic salamanders are being collected from the wild and sold in the United States and the European Union, researchers say. To understand the scale of trade in these animals, […]
Volcano Could Mean Extinction for the Rocket Frog
Biologists near Quito, Ecuador are rushing to evacuate a critically endangered frog species before a volcanic eruption wipes it out. The small, chocolate-striped rocket frog—Hyloxalus (Colostethus) jacobuspetersi—was once common around Quito, even in pastures and backyards (it adapts well to peopled landscapes). Now, for unclear reasons, there is just one population left. Fewer than 100 […]
Amazonian students help monitor threatened frog populations
According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, amphibians are the most threatened group of animals on Earth: currently around 30 percent of the world’s amphibians are listed as threatened with extinction. However this percentage doesn’t include those species about which too little is known to evaluate (26 percent). Amphibians face many threats but […]
Bloodsucking flies help scientists identify rare, hard-to-find mammals
Last year scientists released a study that is likely to revolutionize how conservationists track elusive species. Researchers extracted the recently sucked blood of terrestrial leeches in Vietnam’s remote Annamite Mountains and looked at the DNA of what they’d been feeding on: remarkably researchers were able to identify a number of endangered and rarely-seen mammals. In […]
Palm oil expansion endangering rare frogs in Malaysia
Expansion of the palm oil industry in Malaysia is destroying key habitat for endangered frogs, putting them at greater risk, finds a new study published in the journal Conservation Biology. Over a two-year period, Aisyah Faruk of the Zoological Society of London and colleagues documented the impact of oil palm plantations on the peat swamp […]
Turning up the temperature might save frogs’ lives
Over the past 30 years, amphibians worldwide have been infected with a lethal skin disease known as the amphibian chytrid fungus (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis). “The disease can cause rapid mortality, with infected frogs of susceptible species dying within weeks of infection in the laboratory.” Jodi Rowley, a herpetologist with the Australian Museum told mongabay.com. “This disease […]