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Declining Frog Species (Image 3)
A horned marsupial frog (Gastrotheca cornuta, family Hemiphractidae). This photo was taken in 2002 near El Cope, Panama, two years before the chytrid fungus outbreak.
First noted when the golden toad and about half of the frog species disappeared in Monteverde reserve in Costa Rica in 1987, the killer fungus has been spreading eastward through the Central American highlands and also through a large portion of the Andes Mountains (likely from a separate introduction) ever since.
Researchers like Andrew J. Crawford, an associate professor in the department of biological sciences at the University of the Andes, Columbia, and a research associate at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, are studying the decline in frog populations in parts of South America.
You can read more about the deadly chytrid fungus in the National Science Foundation press release "Frog Killer Caught in the Act." To learn more about Crawford's research and what you can do to help with frog species decline, visit his website Here.
[The fieldwork for this research was supported by National Science Foundation grants GEO 02-13851, DEB 02-34386, DEB 01-30273 and a Small Grant for Exploratory Research, IOS 99-96355.] (Date of Image: 2002) [Image 3 of 3 related images. Back to Image 1.]
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Credit: Andrew J. Crawford, Universidad de los Andes
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