Search Results

Mar

21

2007
 
 

Jumpers and splitters



It's_a_frog's_lifeFrog species splits into two, but both are endangered In little more than a century, the yellow-legged mountain frog Rana muscosa has all but disappeared from the high Sierra Nevada and Transverse ranges, where once it was the most abundant vertebrate. A study published this week in the Journal of Zoology piles the conservation pressure on: it’s not just one species -- it’s two. To make matters worse, according to lead author Vance Vredenberg and colleagues, the “population segments”, which equate to conservation management units, don’t match up with the ranges of the proposed species split. Understanding how species -- a concept even Darwin couldn’t precisely pin down -- are distributed is essential for efforts to save biodiversity. For example, even though one of the “new” frog species is limited to eight tiny populations in the mountains of southern California, others exist in the southern Sierra Nevada. Introduced fish -- especially trout -- are the frog’s biggest threat, although an infectious disease has been muscling in of late. A hundred years is a long time in a frog’s history. Source: Vredenburg VT, Bingham R, Knapp R, Morgan JAT, Moritz C & Wake D (2007) Concordant molecular and phenotypic data delineate new taxonomy and conservation priorities for the endangered mountain yellow-legged frog. Journal of Zoology DOI: 10.1111/j.1469-7998.2006.00258.x Image © Chris Brown

Filed Under Endangered species, Fresh water, Habitat, Monitoring | Leave a Comment

Email This Post Email This Post