The missing amphibians: Mystery or telltale sign?

Originally published 29 February 2000

There was wind in the wil­lows as the Water Rat and the Mole rowed their boat along the riv­er. They were on their way to vis­it Toad of Toad Hall.

“It been a long time since we’ve seen Toady,” said the Rat.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve seen any toad,” observed the Mole.

“What­ev­er can be the prob­lem?” won­dered the Rat.

“Or frogs. Or newts. Or sala­man­ders. The riv­er bank is very qui­et.” The Mole shook his head.

“We must ask Toad what’s hap­pen­ing to the amphib­ians,” said the Rat, his brow fur­rowed with concern.

Just then they round­ed a bend in the riv­er and saw Toad Hall, a hand­some, dig­ni­fied old house of mel­lowed red brick. They glid­ed up to the land­ing and the Mole shipped the oars.

“Toad is usu­al­ly here to greet us,” he said, look­ing about.

“He is, indeed,” puz­zled the Rat. “But look, here comes the Bad­ger shuf­fling down the lawn. Hal­loo, Badger.”

“Well, Rat­ty, my dear lit­tle man,” exclaimed the Bad­ger. “What brings you and Mole to Toad Hall?”

“To see Toady, of course,” said the Rat.

“I’m afraid that will be impos­si­ble,” respond­ed the Bad­ger. “Old Toad has gone from bad to worse. In fact, he passed away just yesterday.”

“Oh dear!” said the Rat and the Mole togeth­er. Then the Rat added: “The Mole and I were just observ­ing that all the amphib­ians seem to be disappearing.”

The Bad­ger grave­ly low­ered his brow. “And not just here along the riv­er. Dis­ap­pear­ing amphib­ians is a world­wide prob­lem. From Michi­gan to Aus­tralia. From Britain to Cos­ta Rica. In the pol­lut­ed envi­rons of cities and in pris­tine nature reserves. Frog pop­u­la­tions, espe­cial­ly, have declined over the past decade. And there seems to be more defor­mi­ties among the frogs that sur­vive — extra legs, that sort of thing. Sci­en­tists are all a‑tizzy, won­der­ing what’s up.”

“Oh, you know those sci­en­tists,” sniffed the Mole. “They are always mak­ing moun­tains out of mole­hills. If they blow up a cri­sis, it helps get fund­ing for their research. ‘The Silence of the Frogs.’ ‘Croak­ing Amphib­ians.’ That sort of thing. It makes good press.”

“I used to be skep­ti­cal, too,” said the Badger.

The Mole con­tin­ued: “Ani­mal pop­u­la­tions go through nat­ur­al cycles. Boom and bust. Growth and col­lapse. We learned about that sort of thing in school. The amphib­ians will recover.”

“We’ll see, we’ll see,” mused the Bad­ger. “With­in the last few years, sci­en­tists have reached a con­sen­sus that the decline is real. They con­sid­ered the pos­si­bil­i­ty of a nat­ur­al cycle, but now they are con­vinced that some­thing glob­al and cat­a­stroph­ic is tru­ly happening.”

“What­ev­er could be the cause?” asked the Rat.

“No one knows for sure,” replied the Bad­ger. “It is well-known that with­out fur or feath­ers to pro­tect them, amphib­ians are espe­cial­ly sen­si­tive to ultra­vi­o­let radi­a­tion from the sun. The decline in the ozone lay­er in the atmos­phere is let­ting in more UV rays. Con­t­a­m­i­na­tion of streams by agri­cul­tur­al chem­i­cals is anoth­er pos­si­ble cause. Some frog pop­u­la­tions have been harmed by par­a­sites and pathogens, but per­haps the ani­mals’ nat­ur­al resis­tance has been weak­ened by oth­er factors.”

The Rat scratched his head: “Any­one who lives along the riv­er knows that amphib­ians are the least resilient to stress. What­ev­er is hap­pen­ing to the frogs may be in store for the rest of us.”

“Amphib­ians are a key part of the food chain,” said the Bad­ger. “They help con­trol insect pop­u­la­tions. They sup­ply food for fish, snakes, birds, and mam­mals, and keep the streams clear by eat­ing algae. If the amphib­ians go, life along the riv­er will get very qui­et indeed.”

“I’m still skep­ti­cal,” sniffed the Mole.

“Time will tell,” said the Bad­ger. “A Declin­ing Amphib­ian Pop­u­la­tion Task Force, made up of a hun­dred groups of sci­en­tists world­wide, is study­ing the amphib­ian­s’s decline. In the Unit­ed States, the Nation­al Sci­ence Foun­da­tion has begun seri­ous­ly fund­ing amphib­ian stud­ies. The miss­ing frogs, toads, newts and sala­man­ders may be nature’s way of telling us that we are mak­ing a mess of the environment.”

The Rat and the Mole made their good-byes to the Bad­ger and got back in their boat. As they rowed up the stream, the Rat took note of plas­tic bags caught in the bank­side reeds, float­ing drink cans that bumped against the boat, and the alga scum that coat­ed the blades of their oars. He won­dered about all the invis­i­ble con­t­a­m­i­nates in the glob­al envi­ron­ment, such as chlo­ro­flu­o­ro­car­bons that erode the ozone, even in places osten­si­bly unspoiled.

“Bad­ger’s such a wor­ry-wart,” said the Mole.

“Hmmm,” said the Rat.