Change your clock, save a frog

Nice to see this effort from the Association of Zoos and Aquariums:

Zoos and aquariums across the country will hold events and activities to raise awareness about amphibian conservation. Scheduled events include live encounters with amphibians, informative amphibian exhibits, programs on “frog friendly” backyards, zookeeper talks about amphibian ecosystems, crafts, contests, games, prizes, and all kinds of family fun.

AZA

It is estimated that at least one-third of known amphibian species are threatened with extinction. AZA-accredited zoos and aquariums, with their demonstrated expertise in endangered species breeding programs and commitment to conservation, are meeting this challenge. Learn more at http://www.aza.org/ConScience/spring-forward/.

WHAT: Spring Forward for Amphibians!

WHEN: The switch to Daylight Savings time on or before March 8th.

WHERE: At an AZA-accredited zoo or aquarium near you http://www.aza.org/FindZooAquarium/.

CONTACT: Courtney Jordan, AZA, 301-562-0777, ext. 235

Founded in 1924, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) is a nonprofit 501c(3) organization dedicated to the advancement of zoos and aquariums in the areas of conservation, education, science, and recreation. Look for the AZA logo whenever you visit a zoo or aquarium as your assurance that you are supporting an institution dedicated to providing excellent care for animals, a great experience for you, and a better future for all living things. With its more than 200 accredited members, the AZA is a leader in global wildlife conservation, and your link to helping animals in their native habitats. For more information, please visit www.aza.org.

 

Cleaning the frogs before they hop on the ark

San Diego Zoo hosted a conference of scientists to review new, stringent standards for making sure amphibians don’t have the frog killer chytrid fungus as they come to zoos for “protective custody” against the many forces that are wiping them out in the wild. Story here.

 

Selena Gomez and Kermit saving frogs

 I have a young daughter who loves The Disney Channel, and therefore I’ve come to know the very charming young actress Selena Gomez, star of the channel’s Wizards of Waverly Place. She is now appearing in a PSA on the amphibian crisis with Kermit the Frog. You can learn more about it on www.yearofthefrog.org. I looked up Selena’s origins on Wikipedia and see that her father comes from Mexico and her mother has Italian in her blood. So, Selena, if you’re reading this, thanks. And here are some links to show you what the frog situation is in Mexico and Italy:

• Link to AmphibiaWeb.org’s Mexico amphibian page.
• Link to AmphibiaWeb.org’s Italy page.

Here’s the full press release on the PSA:

PSA Launched to Help Amphibians Disney, Amphibian Ark, Conservation International (CI) and the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) have launched a Public Service Announcement (PSA) starring Kermit the Frog and Selena Gomez from Disney Channel’s “The Wizards of Waverly Place” calling attention to the plight of the world’s amphibians. Washington, DC (Vocus/PRWEB ) September 3, 2008 -– Disney, Amphibian Ark, Conservation International (CI) and the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) have launched a Public Service Announcement (PSA) starring Kermit the Frog and Selena Gomez from Disney Channel’s “The Wizards of Waverly Place” calling attention to the plight of the world’s amphibians.     The PSA began airing on Disney Channel this week and asks people to visit www.yearofthefrog.org to get involved in amphibian conservation. Broadcast quality copies of the PSA are available for download at http://newsinfusion.com/video_details.php?videoId=210. This year has been declared the Year of the Frog to mark a major conservation effort to address the amphibian crisis and to engage the public in conservation efforts. Frogs, toads, salamanders and other amphibians are in danger. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) predicts that at least one-third of known amphibian species are in danger of disappearing from the earth for good. “We are honored to have the help of Kermit and Selena to spread the message of amphibian conservation,” said AZA President and CEO Jim Maddy. “Amphibian Ark, Conservation International and zoos and aquariums around the world are working hard to save amphibians.” “The disappearance of amphibians around the world is not only a symptom of our impact on the planet, it is also an opportunity to unite in the challenge to do something about it. With nearly two decades of intensive research into the causes of amphibian declines, we are well positioned to implement conservation projects to save even Critically Endangered frogs, salamanders, and caecilians from extinction,” said Claude Gascon, Executive Vice President of Conservation International and Co-Chair of the Amphibian Specialist Group. “I cannot say it any better than Kermit did so many years ago: ‘It seems to me that if you wait until the frogs and toads have croaked their last to take some action, you’ve missed the point,’” said Amphibian Ark Program Director Kevin Zippel. “This is the greatest extinction event amphibians have ever experienced and humans have ever witnessed. Since we are the cause, we must also be the solution.” Amphibian Ark is a partnership between the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA), IUCN/SSC Conservation Breeding Specialist Group, and IUCN/SSC Amphibian Specialist Group. It was formed to develop, promote, and guide short term captive management of threatened amphibians, making possible the long-term survival of species for which adequate protection in the wild is not currently possible. For additional information about Amphibian Ark please visit www.amphibianark.org. Conservation International (CI) applies innovations in science, economics, policy and community participation to protect the Earth’s richest regions of plant and animal diversity in the biodiversity hotspots, high-biodiversity wilderness areas and key marine ecosystems. With headquarters in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, CI works in more than 40 countries on four continents. For more information about CI, visit www.conservation.org. Founded in 1924, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) is a nonprofit 501c(3) organization dedicated to the advancement of zoos and aquariums in the areas of conservation, education, science, and recreation. Look for the AZA logo whenever you visit a zoo or aquarium as your assurance that you are supporting an institution dedicated to providing excellent care for animals, a great experience for you, and a better future for all living things. With its more than 200 accredited members, the AZA is a leader in global wildlife conservation, and your link to helping animals in their native habitats. For more information, please visit www.aza.org.

 

Sir David Attenborough signs petition to save frogs

Here’s proof that Sir David Attenborough on Dec. 19 signed the “save the frog” petition that was sanctioned by the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums in Budapest in August. And here is the online petition you can go to, right now, to add your name.

 

Basketball, Amphibian Ark, and the Need for a Quick Win

I love basketball, but I was never good at it. That’s not Coach Dyer’s fault; he offered encouragement to me back in the seventh grade. I simply didn’t practice enough — didn’t repeat the muscle movements over and over again so that the proper form and motion happened automatically. Muscle memory, they call it.  

Now, I have to admit, I really don’t love amphibians. I never had a frog as a pet, never dragged my parents to the amphibian house when we would visit the zoo, and never understood, until recently, that they are the canaries in the coal mine for our planet’s health. But now that I know Kermit’s in big trouble, I can’t walk away from it.  A team of us at my company is helping a new organization, named Amphibian Ark, to rally support — from governments, corporations, foundations, and consumers — so that it can capture and breed hundreds of threatened amphibian species. 

Among the World Conservation Union’s (IUCN) Red List of most endangered wildlife, amphibians hold the distinction of potentially losing up to one-half of their entire class of animal life to extinction in our lifetime – almost 3,000 species. That would be the largest mass extinction since the dinosaurs. Amphibian Ark (AArk) was created by IUCN, Conservation Breeding Specialist Group, and the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums to do the urgent work that’s necessary to avert the mass extinction, while other organizations will tackle the longer term problems, such as  pollution and habitat loss.

It hasn’t been difficult getting media coverage for the issue, thankfully. But the ultimate success of Amphibian Ark depends on raising $50-$60 million pretty quickly. We need to make a personal impact with the people around the world who write checks, large and small. And let’s be honest, the number of environmental causes competing for funding is starting to look like an L.A. freeway at 4:00.

What separates Amphibian Ark, however, is its relative simplicity and potential for a speedy, happy ending. Once the money starts to flow, Kevin Zippel, a herpetologist and the master builder of the AArk plan, will dispatch scientists to remote areas of the world to capture species, then distribute the frogs, salamanders, newts, toads, and caecilians to multiple zoos.  They’re placing each species in several locations to reduce the chance of disease delivering a coup de grace.

Kevin would make a good basketball coach. He knows the X’s and O’s for saving frogs. He just needs a good booster organization. And we’re building it for him.

It seems to me that, in the U.S. at least, many of us think about our environment the same way I thought about basketball. It’s fun to take a few shots, but not much fun to stay after practice to shoot a hundred free throws. When you miss, you have to retrieve the errant ball, return to the line, and do it all over again. A hundred times, every day.  We need to develop muscle memory to face and manage the really important environmental issues. If we begin with a regimen a small steps to save our planet, confidently expecting a positive outcome for our sacrifice, the momentum will alter the future for our children and their children. A quick “win” would do wonders for conditioning that muscle. AArk can provide that quick win.Dr. Jeffrey Bonner, the president of the St. Louis Zoo, is the visionary who brought us into this issue. He asked us to sit down with him to discuss the action plan for fixing the amphibian crisis. He calls Amphibian Ark a landmark learning experience for mankind. I believe he’s right.

 

Great summary piece on the crisis and Amphibian Ark

Alisa Opar writes about the amphibian crisis and the Amphibian Ark connection in today’s Plenty Magazine online. 

 

The most threatened U.S. and Canada species

Here’s a new list of threatened amphibian species in the U.S. and Canada, ranked in order of priority for bringing into captivity and breeding under the Amphibian Ark initiative.  The plan in the U.S.  and Canada is going to be implemented by the zoos and aquariums accredited by the Association of Zoos & Aquariums.  The list starts on page 2. At the top of the list: the Ozark Hellbender, a salamander, pictured above.

 

RIP: The frog that burped her babies

The gastric-brooder (Rheobatrachus silus) was discovered in the 1970s and vanished within 20 years. The culprit? You guessed it: chytrid. This miracle of Australia would hatch its eggs in her stomach and then, voila!, the little brooder-ettes would hop out of her mouth. Now, you should be asking yourself how eggs could survive in a stomach full of enzymes to break down food. The fact is, enzyme production somehow shut down during gestation. Scientists think that a lot could have been learned from it all – a cure for gastric ulcers, perhaps, or new insights for treating obesity. But we’ll never know.  Once you’re extinct, there’s no rewind button.

 

The Pregnancy Test That Birthed A Global Epidemic

Back in the 1930s and 1940s, the African Clawed Frog was discovered to be a heck of a good pregnancy test. The species is indigenous to southern Africa and is immune to something else indigenous to the region — chytrid fungus. So when the frog was shipped around the world for this medical use, it brought the chytrid fungus along for the ride.  Wherever the fungus took root in countless new places around the world, it was fatal to 80% of the new species it encountered. So what’s it really do? See “TBS Program…” post from yesterday. Or here are two articles: a good overview by the Australian National Parks and Wildlife Service and one filled with science jargon by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control.

 

The Petition to Save Amphibians

Learn about the petition that recently was launched in Budapest at the World Association of Zoos & Aquariums conference.  Here’s a Reuters wire story about it.