Alaskan Biologists Seek Rapidly Disappearing Toads

[hatrack]

"Bob Armstrong remembers the days when toads were common at the Dredge Lake area, between Back Loop road and Mendenhall Lake. 'It was so thick you could hardly walk without stepping on them,' the longtime outdoorsman and naturalist said. 'Almost anyplace you'd go in the Juneau area, you'd run across them.'

But over the past 30 to 40 years, the number of toads has dropped to levels so low it's taken a concerted effort to find the ones that remain.

Funded by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game and working with the Juneau-based nature education group Discovery Southeast, Armstrong and other naturalists and volunteers have been studying local amphibians on and off for the past two years, hiking up ridges, wading into beaver ponds and squatting next to gravel-road ruts. After examining 150 ponds, including detailed study of 42 within a half-mile of Juneau's road system, they've found seven with breeding populations of native toads, plus hints of three more.

Whatever is killing off Juneau's toads could be part of a global trend threatening amphibian populations. The cause could be a combination of factors including pollution, global warming, a type of fungus and changes in the ozone layer, said ecologist Mary Wilson, who is involved in the study."

EDIT

http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/100703/loc_ribbit.shtml

[gristy]

1. My sister lives in Anchorage, and she says it indeed is getting

very warm up there. I think I've read there has been a 5 degree increase in the average temperature in AK.