Sir David the Love Doctor for Frogs

Funny item. Full store here.

Attenborough ‘inspires’ frog mating

1 hour ago

Love was certainly in the air when naturalist Sir David Attenborough visited ZSL London Zoo.

Eight Mission Golden-eyed Tree frogs, which had lived at Reptile House for almost three years without mating, finally did the deed during his visit.

Keepers admitted it was more likely the amphibians finally mated because of a humidifier placed in their new tank.

 

Amphibians: miraculously and disastrously adaptable

You’ve heard the saying, adapt or die. How about adapt and die? Reading a new scientific report by David B. Wake and Vance T. Vredenburg, on the mass extinction that Amphibian Ark aims to avert, a new thought surfaces: Amphibians outlived the dinosaurs because of their adaptability — hey, they’re the Transformers of the animal world — yet the sensitive biomechanisms that make adaptability possible also put them at the greatest risk from new dangers created by man. Hence, their suffering today represents a canary in the coal mine warning us that the planet is in trouble. I recommend reading the full story from the National Academy of Sciences (of USA), but I pasted an excerpt below. And, the Los Angeles Times published a piece on it.

Why this should be has perplexed amphibian specialists. A large number of factors have been implicated, including most prominently habitat destruction and epidemics of infectious disease (19); global warming also has been invoked as a contributing factor (20). What makes the amphibian case so compelling is the fact that amphibians are long-term survivors that have persisted through the last four mass extinctions. Paradoxically, although amphibians have proven themselves to be survivors in the past, there are reasons for thinking that they might be vulnerable to current environmental challenges and, hence, serve as multipurpose sentinels of environmental health. The typical life cycle of a frog involves aquatic development of eggs and larvae and terrestrial activity as adults, thus exposing them to a wide range of environments. Frog larvae are typically herbivores, whereas adults are carnivores, thus exposing them to a wide diversity of food, predators, and parasites. Amphibians have moist skin, and cutaneous respiration is more important than respiration by lungs. The moist, well vascularized skin places them in intimate contact with their environment. One might expect them to be vulnerable to changes in water or air quality resulting from diverse pollutants. Amphibians are thermal-conformers, thus making them sensitive to environmental temperature changes, which may be especially important for tropical montane (e.g., cloud forest) species that have experienced little temperature variation. Such species may have little acclimation ability in rapidly changing thermal regimes. 

 

 

 

 

Cousteau video on frogs, amphibian crisis, Amphibian Ark

This is a really great, new video of Jean-Michel Cousteau explaining his personal commitment to Amphibian Ark and overviewing the amphibian extinction crisis. Check out the photo of him and his father, Jacques-Yves Cousteau, and the frog menagerie that Jean-Michel has in his home office.

Amphibian Ark truly is fortunate to have a dream team of conservationist “celebrities” supporting our cause: Jean-Michel is joined by Sir David Attenborough and Jeff Corwin in lending time and talent to make the world take notice that we are in danger of losing up to half of the world’s 6,000 amphibian species. Note that the video ends with the new 5 for Frogs campaign logo. Hope you will get involved.