Habitat Destruction | Pollution & Pesticides | Climate Change | Invasive Species | Over-Harvesting | Infectious Diseases
Climate Change & Global Warming
Climate Change in Tropical Regions
Climate Change in Temperate Regions
Reduce Your Carbon Footprint
Frogs in Airports!
Unlike reptiles or birds, which have hard-shelled eggs, amphibians have jelly-like, unshelled eggs that cannot survive desiccation. Amphibians need moist climates to reproduce, and this makes them extremely sensitive to climate change. Frogs in high mountainous areas are most affected by global warming.
Climate Change in Tropical Regions
In many areas of the world, especially in the tropics, mountainous areas have extremely high amphibian biodiversity. For instance, some sites in the mountains of Costa Rica and Panama may have up to 60 species. In these tropical montane areas, many of the amphibians live in cloud forests, and lay their eggs in the moist leaf-litter. As the eggs are laid away from water bodies, the embryos bypass the aquatic tadpole stage and hatch directly into tiny froglets. These 'direct-developing' species (like the Marsupial Frog Assa darlingtoni pictured here) are under serious threat from global warming, which acts to raise the cloud levels. If the cloud's average elevation increases a few hundred meters, the frogs at the newly-exposed lower elevations lose their habitat (and their lives) as the soil dries.
While the affected frogs could potentially move up the mountain to find cool, moist habitat, many frog species already live at the tops of mountains, so when their habitat dries or warms, they have nowhere left to go. Another issue is that mountains are shaped like cones, and at a given elevation, there is less total area at higher elevations, so an amphibian that is forced to higher elevations would find itself in potentially crowded conditions. Further, some frog species live only on a single mountain range, or even on a single mountain, so when problems arise they are extremely prone to extinction.
Climate change also affects host-parasite relationships. The deadly chytrid fungus (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis) is expanding its elevational range in the high Andes of Peru as the glaciers melt and new lakes are formed. The fungus was recently found infecting Telmatobius frogs as high as 5348m elevation.
Climate Change in Temperate Regions
Pond-breeding species are dependent on water bodies that do not dry up before their tadpoles can metamorphose. In Yellowstone National Park, droughts have been increasing over the last 50 years, and 25% of the ponds that existed in the early 1990's no longer fill with water. As the four amphibian species in the park are pond-breeders, it is not surprising that three of the four species are thought to now be declining in numbers, such as the Columbia Spotted Frog (Rana luteiventris) pictured here. Learn more about climate change in Yellowstone here.
Yellowstone is the world's oldest protected area, having been preserved as a National park since 1872, so if climate change is already affecting the park's wildlife, we have to assume that climate change is having an even more significant effect elsewhere in the world, where habitat destruction, pollution and pesticides, and over-harvesting are likely to compound matters.
Global warming has also been shown to negatively affect common toads (Bufo bufo) in the United Kingdom. In warm years, females were thinner, laid fewer eggs, and had reduced survival rates. Read more in this article by C.J. Reading.
Eight ways to reduce your carbon footprint
While governmental action is an integral part of stopping global warming, every one of us is responsible for reducing our own carbon footprint. Here are eight easy ways you can do your part:
Turn off the lights
If you're not in the room (or the house), you probably don't need the lights on. Same with your office-place, and those lights in the parking lot. Try solar power for outside lights.
Don't purchase bottled water
Plan ahead and fill your re-usable bottle. Not only is plastic produced from oil, but it takes fuel to get that bottle of water from the source to the store at which you buy it.
Eat less meat
Cows live in pastures, which means rainforests worldwide are being destroyed to make way for cows. Without the rainforests to trap carbon, we don't stand much of a chance at fighting global warming. But that's not it: cows, pigs, sheep and goats are responsible for about 30% of America's methane emission -- and methane is far worse for the environment than carbon dioxide!
Take shorter showers
There is a high chance your hot water is being heated by electricity generated at a coal-fired power plant.
Don't fly first-class
Airplanes produce significant quantities of carbon emisions, and those spacious first-class seats take up 50% more space than do normal seats. That means you'e responsible for 50% more of that plane's carbon emissions than economy passengers.
Invest in environmentally-friendly businesses
If a company puts effort into improving their environmental practices, they likely have some information about it on their website. Do some reseach prior to investing, and then give your support to companies with positive environmental track records.
Drive less. Buy and rent smaller cars.
Eat at a restaurant closer to home, or stay home and eat. Get yourself a good book and try the local public transport sometime (it's probably improved since the last time you used it!). And next time you buy or rent a car, go with a fuel-efficient small car unless you have a true need for a large vehicle.
Donate to SAVE THE FROGS!
Please help us get our My Ponds Are Drying Up posters up in airports around the country so that tens of thousands of people know what climate change is doing to frogs, and so they come to the savethefrogs.com website and educate themselves on ways to reduce their carbon footprint. ClearChannel graciously donates the advertising space to SAVE THE FROGS!, but we need to pay the printing costs. Even $10 helps, so please chip in!
Your tax-deductible donation ensures we have the funds necessary to educate our society and businesses about global warming and ways to prevent it, and to ensure our politicians make the changes necessary to protect frog species from climate change. 2,000 amphibian species are already on the verge of extinction, so please be an active part of the solution. Thanks!
Recommended Reading & Viewing
Please read this excellent article on climate change by Vice President Al Gore that appeared in the New York Times November 9th, 2008.
Watch this fabulous video on the relationship between beef and global warming; it features Bill Nye (the Science Guy).
Future climate change spells catastrophe for Blanchard’s cricket
frog -- McCallum 2010
Linking global warming to amphibian declines through its effects
on female body condition and survivorship -- Reading 2007
Climate Change and Yellowstone's Amphibians -- McMenamin 2008
Salamanders and Climate Change in Central America -- Rovito 2009
Learn about other threats to frogs
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