Kerala: Chance discovery of frog species at Thattekkad - Times of India

-
KOCHI: A trip to take photographs of dragonfly lizards at Thattekkad Salim Ali bird sanctuary in Ernakulam turned into an event of identifying a new frog species along the Western Ghats region. Scientists have identified a freshwater species and named it Euphlyctis jaladhara with a common name Jaladhara skittering frog due to its habitat – a water reservoir.
It started with Dr BH Channakesavamurthy's trip, when he was with the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) in 2017 along with a team of other scientists. "I happened to see a fresh water frog with soil colour against the usual green. It increased my curiosity and I took two specimens from the spot in my wet vest. We submitted the specimen for scientific study," he said.
Later multiple populations of this species have been identified along western coastal plains of the country. Scientists from ZSI, Mount Carmel College and the National Institute of Science Education and Research in Bhubaneswar collaborated in discovering the species.
Initial studies suggest that the new species is found in freshwater bodies along the western edge of the foothills of the Western Ghats and the western coastal plains. The new species looks similar to the common skittering frog (Euphlyctis cyanophlyctis), which is predominantly distributed in the eastern coastal plains, Deccan plateau and Western Ghats of peninsular India which was discovered 220 years ago.
Scientist K P Dinesh said, amphibians are the 'living vertebrate link between the vertebrate life in water and land' and the new species is predominantly a freshwater frog and these are the first vertebrate organisms to get affected due to water pollution due to their primitive body plan.
"For the new species like 'Jaladhara skittering frog' special conservation plans need to be focused as their distribution is flanked between the salt waters of Arabian Sea and the foothills of the Western Ghats hill chains," Dinesh said.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

All In The Family: Maine Mother & Son Charged in Massive Drug Bust

-
Image
corso dog :: Article Creator Woman Hospitalized After Attack By 2 Dogs At Same Edmonton Home Where Boy Died: Lawyer UPDATE: On April 15, 2024, the City of Edmonton provided an update on the fatal attack. It said that prior to the deadly incident on April 1, "the city had no lawful basis to remove the dogs from the home." The city added that "all prior complaints about the dogs involved in this incident were investigated thoroughly and appropriate action was taken in accordance with the applicable legislation." The city also said a review found that its staff "acted appropriately in accordance with our standard practices and in compliance with the relevant legal constraints given the nature of past complaints and reports." A woman was hospitalized after being attacked in February by two large Cane Corso dogs at the same home where an 11-year-old boy was killed last week, the woman's lawyer told Global News. "I...
Read more

Rare Frogs And Illegal Drugs - Palisades Hudson Financial Group

-
Image
Colombian conservationist Ivan Lozano has hit on a brilliantly promising strategy to protect his country’s rare and endangered amphibians. His plan: Flood the market with them. Lozano is not hunting rare frogs in Colombia’s Andean forests. He is raising them himself and selling them at prices designed to undercut poachers and smugglers. If he can raise the frogs cheaply enough, and in large enough numbers, he might manage to drive down the market price to the point that poachers no longer find it worthwhile to harvest and smuggle the creatures onto the black markets. Lozano told The Associated Press that his company also encourages collectors to breed their own frogs. Picture yourself as a poacher. If the government toughens the legal penalties and steps up enforcement, you will shrug your shoulders; legal risks are a basic cost of doing business. Since the demand for your product already exists among foreign collectors and other buyers, tougher enforcement merely reduces supply a...
Read more

Burn scars, winter storms threaten rare and endangered species in San Gabriel Mountains - The Bakersfield Californian

-
Image
LOS ANGELES — Up until a few weeks ago, the West Fork of the San Gabriel River was one of the most abundant wildlife habitats in Los Angeles County, a secluded and rugged area defined by its steep peaks, lush canyons and mixture of rare and endangered species. Recently however, a team of federal biologists and forest rangers was aghast when it visited the stream following the Bobcat fire, which has burned more than 115,000 acres in the heart of the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument. Terrain that once resembled a High Sierra granite gorge now looked like ground zero after a nuclear explosion, and the usually clean mountain air was sharp with the stench of smoke. Particularly unsettling were the bare and ashen slopes that were now primed to dissolve under pounding winter storms. A heavy mudslide, experts said, could reverse decades of conservation efforts by inundating the last outposts for such federally protected species as the Santa Ana sucker fish and Southern California m...
Read more