Toughie, who spent the last eleven years in retirement from his forest canopy job in Panama, died on September 28th in the Atlanta Botanical Garden. The last of his kind, he was grabbed out of the wild in an urgent 2005 rescue mission to save as many frogs as possible when the deadly chytrid fungus swept through the cloud forest in central Panama. The fungus was especially deadly in this small range (less than 39 square miles) and field studies say it’s likely that 85 percent of all amphibians who shared his home territory were wiped out.
We didn’t even know what species he was until 2008 when he was described as a Rabb’s fringe-limbed treefrog. Scientists say we will lose half of all species by the end of this century, whether we’ve seen and described them or not. In many cases, we won’t know what is lost although so far we have catalogued 1.3 million species. Each year more than 15,000 new species are found and scientists estimate there are 8.7 million species on the planet, plus or minus 1.3 million.
Although officially describing species is scientifically important, more crucial is that we care and love all the life on earth whether it benefits us humans or not. You probably never saw this treefrog, but they were cool and unique.
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Rabb’s fringe-limbed treefrogs are similar to other frogs in the genus with huge webbed hands and feet they spread out to glide 30 feet through their forest canopy homes. Males defend breeding spots, water-filled holes in trees, and care-take the babies, guarding and feeding them. Their tadpoles are the only frogs known to feed on skin cells, directly rasping them off the fathers’ backs as daddy frog rests half-submerged in the tree cavity.
Initially, the rescued amphibians like Toughie were sent to several captive breeding facilities in hopes of saving the species and perhaps returning them to the wild. But although the frogs thrived in captivity, they didn’t breed and the last female died in 2009. Toughie was the last survivor and has his own wikipedia page.
The chytrid fungus, discovered in 1998, has devastated amphibians worldwide. Scientists believe the fungus originates in Africa and likely spread through exportation of African clawed frogs for the pet trade. Thus, worldwide devastations from the fungus probably are due to human activities. American bullfrogs also carry the disease and it has been found on soil and bird feathers, suggesting these also help move the fungus to new locations.
Your life may not be changed by this week’s extinction of another frog species and Toughie’s death now has no effect on his habitat because none of his kind have been home since the fungus wiped them out. But the loss of all those amphibians from their cloud forest habitat undoubtedly does have a significant effect in that ecosystem and represents one small portion of human-caused events that are unravelling habitats around the globe.
The portions of the world humans inhabit are connected to all the others and we are affected by what is lost, even those organisms we’ve never seen and never will as they die before we find them. This isn’t just happening somewhere else, in Africa where elephant populations are dwindling. It’s also in Florida where only 165 individual panthers survive. It’s not only big marvelous animals that most everyone can name, it’s also masked bees in Hawaii, the first bees listed under the Endangered Species Act just this week. Tiny fish like the Delta smelt may not seem important, but they are indicator species that are first to inform us of trouble in their San Francisco Bay-Delta ecosystem that funnels water from the Sierra Nevada Mountains to the Pacific Ocean.
People who work on the edge of extinction hope that bringing their stories to the public will motivate people to care about these organisms and their habitats. National Geographic’s Photo Ark is documenting every species brought into captivity in hopes of saving them. Founder Joel Sartore has visited 40 countries and photographed more than 6,000 species.
Photo Ark aims to showcase our planet's incredible biodiversity and inspire people to help fight the extinction crisis while there is still time. [...]
“About once a year I photograph something that's the last of its kind or close to it,” he says. “I get sad and angry because I can't imagine that this won't wake the world up and get people to care about extinction. I keep thinking, OK, this is the one. This animal's story is going to do it and get people to care more about extinction than about what's on TV.
“They can't care if they don't know these animals,” he adds. “They have to meet them and fall in love with them the way that I have and so many others have.”
Whose story is going to do it for you? As Sartore says, “I want people to care, to fall in love, and to take action.” You can take action.
I’m always sharing examples of where action is needed and what you can do. Want more ideas about how you can be involved? Start here.
Center for Biological Diversity
Defenders of Wildlife
The Xerces Society
Spotlight on Green News & Views (posted every Saturday at 5 pm PT and Wednesday at 3:30 pm PT on the Daily Kos Front Page)