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Leaping forward for reptiles and amphibians

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Archives for December 2023

Awesome Amphibians

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Written by Chloe Davey, Transforming Lives Trainee

Usually when you ask someone what their favourite animal is, the answer is typically either some kind of mammal or reptile. Of course, there is nothing wrong with that as there are many amazing species all over the world. The popularity of these kinds of animals could possibly be due to ideologies pushed towards the public eye, influencing their views on certain animals for better or for worse. This means that amphibians are often overlooked except for frogs and axolotls whose popularity with the younger generation have risen greatly over the last few years. So, I would like to express what makes amphibians so wonderful. Why should they be given more love and recognition?

As we know, amphibians are cold-blooded vertebrates that live on land and in water. They cannot generate their own body heat, instead they rely on the temperature of their environment. They will bask in the rising sun, absorbing the warm rays and preparing them for the day ahead. Did you know that amphibians are an ancient species? It’s true! Amphibians have been around for 340 million years!

Amphibians from around the world can come in many beautiful, vibrant colours but this means they are also incredibly toxic! Despite not being very colourful though, our very own common toad has a toxin which is used to deter predators although grass snakes seem to be unaffected by it.

Life begins in the water as eggs, newts will fold plant leaves over their eggs for better protection from predators. Once they are born, they have gills which allow them to breathe underwater and a long tail to help them swim.

During development they have the amazing ability to metamorphose. This means they can change their body structure, how cool is that? They grow arms and legs which slowly replace the tail over time. Some amphibians, like newts for example, will continue to develop their tail. They develop lungs which allow them to breathe air, replacing gills. Even without gills though, amphibians have special skin that allows them to breathe underwater by absorbing the oxygen.

Currently there are over 8,200 known species worldwide. Sadly, there are around 2,490 that are classified as endangered. I’m grateful that in the UK we have seven species of our very own including frogs, toads and newts. It may not seem like much, but we should protect them while we still have the chance.

If you’d like to learn more about our native amphibians, check out our web page. 

New Year’s Eve- My Resolutions

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Written by Chloe Davey: Transforming Lives Trainee

As we venture closer and closer toward the new year, we are given a chance to reflect on our journey of the year we shall soon be leaving behind. Through good times and bad, there have been accomplishments made along the way and downfalls to overcome. With the hope of a new year around the corner, it gives us an opportunity to set up new goals and think about what we would like to achieve or change for the better. Allow me to share my journey through 2023, what I’ve learnt and a preview of my intentions for the upcoming year.

Transforming Lives Trainees doing some pond maintenance

In 2023 I started off my journey being rather disappointed. I’d been trying to find work since I left college back in 2017. I had a few temporary positions, spent a lot of time volunteering in different establishments and received little to no response from every job I had applied for. Not letting the disappointment consume me, I continued to hold out hope. This year had to be the one- I desperately wanted to find my calling. With a developing confidence I began attending job fairs. It wasn’t until my third attempt, I finally found what I was looking for. Froglife, what’s that? I had a wonderful conversation with their Reserve Warden, as she spoke I felt a connection. A spark. This was it…this was my calling!

I’ve always had a passion for nature and animals. The Transforming Lives traineeship has been the perfect opportunity I’d been hoping for. I get to train for a job that I truly love and want to do. I’ve learnt so much in only six months, how to identify native species and to survey and maintain habitats. I joined an amazing, team of other trainees that are supportive and I can share a good laugh with. I’ve developed confidence and have grown so much as a person. When the traineeship eventually comes to an end, I look forward to exploring the new opportunities that await me.

Transforming Lives Trainees with their log pile

It goes to show that you should never underestimate the power of hope as it can lead you to better paths and opportunities. No matter how 2023 may have treated you, I hope there will be many wonderful adventures and opportunities come your way this year.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Winter Volunteering at Our Reserves

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Written by Jade Walton, Transforming Lives Trainee

For the management of our Peterborough sites, we rely on the help of volunteers to get as much work done as possible for the benefit of our local reptiles and amphibians.

During the spring and summer months this mainly consists of helping with our surveying efforts, but during the colder months, our work is just as, if not even more important.

Once the weather is cold enough for our reptile and amphibian species to brumate (similar to hibernating), we must get to work with habitat management. This includes pond restoration, creation, and management, as well as scrub clearance, hibernaculum and log pile creation, and setting up and maintaining survey routes for the next survey season.

Given the size of our reserves and the limited time window to conduct the habitat management, this is not an easy task! Hence our call for volunteers at each of our Peterborough reserves. Volunteering dates run throughout the year, mostly on week days, but with occasional Saturday dates.

Volunteering with us is a great way to stay active during the winter, and provides an opportunity to learn new skills such as pond management and tree coppicing. It also gives you the chance to connect with other nature lovers, and to socialise with like-minded people.

At Froglife, we are extremely grateful to all of our volunteers, past, present, and future.
If you would like to join us at one of our volunteer days, or would just like some more information, please email our reserve warden clare.middleton@froglife.org

Amphibian Adaptations to Extreme Environments

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Written by Kaitlin Oliver, Transforming Lives Trainee

Amphibians have the remarkable ability to live in some of the most extreme environments and being found everywhere on earth except Antarctica. From the dry deserts, to the perilous freezing temperatures in the Arctic. Amphibians are everywhere, so let me tell you about two that live in some of the most extreme environments.

Desert spadefoot toads are fascinating amphibians known for their unique adaptations that enable them to thrive in arid environments. They are found in deep sandy areas and will burrow underground using their spade-like hind feet, escaping the hot, dehydrating arid interior of Australia. These toads are nocturnal and will hunt a variety of invertebrates such as spiders and other small arthropods. During periods of heavy rainfall, these toads engage in explosive breeding events. Males call to attract females to temporary pools formed by rain. Remarkably the tadpoles of spadefoot toads have a short developmental period compared to other amphibians due to the temporary pool drying up quickly after rainfall.

Desert Spadefoot Toad- Credit- Angus McNab

From one extreme to another, we have the wood frog. Famous for its ability to survive freezing temperatures during winter by freezing themselves! As temperatures drop, these frogs enter a state of hibernation where their heart and breathing activities cease. About 70-80% of their body water can freeze, and they essentially become “frogsicles.” They can endure this frozen state for months, thawing out and resuming normal activity when temperatures rise. These nocturnal frogs can be found in boreal and deciduous forests and spend most of their lives on the forest floor but migrate to breeding ponds during the spring. Like spadefoot toad, wood frogs also partake in explosive breeding events where large groups gather at breeding ponds for a short period during the spring.

Wood Frog- Credit Brian Gratwicke

These adaptations showcase the incredible diversity of amphibians and their ability to thrive in a wide range of environments, from the hottest deserts to the coldest Arctic regions. Amphibians are truly amazing!

What our animals are doing this month

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Written by Ellia Cobb, Transforming Lives Trainee

It’s a new year, the weather is cold, and reptiles and amphibians are still in brumation, keeping warm in these cold months. Though we are getting closer and closer to their breeding period where newts will take to the ponds and perform a mating ritual to attract mates, we still have a few months until then.

Right now, it is important for them to keep warm to stay alive. At this time of year, the weather doesn’t typically warm up much, reptiles and amphibians will remain in a deep state of torpor (deep sleep) and won’t stir from their brumation until we have a few warmer days. They typically look for places such as compost heaps, leaf litter and other garden waste: rocks, logs and cracks in the ground to see out the winter. Some amphibians even choose to brumate in the center of ponds where it is warmer, and they have lots of vegetation to tuck themselves into.

This period gives us the chance to prepare and restore ponds ready for the next survey season. It is very important we keep the ponds suitable for the amphibians if we want to maintain a healthy population and prevent succession. Newts need a 60:40 ratio of sunlight to cover and a variety of different vegetation and invertebrates to feed on. Without these things the ponds are not suitable. 

 

Croaking Science: are our pet’s flea treatments harming pondlife?

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Written by Elsbeth Leighton, Coalface to Wildspace Project Assistant

As a nation, the UK has a lot of pets, so much so that we are often labelled as a “nation of animal lovers”. Over half of us have pets, which includes 12 million dogs, 11 million cats and another few millions small animals such as rabbits and hamsters (Kantar/Soulor Consulting, 2023). Being responsible and caring pet owners, we want to do what’s best for our animals and follow vet advice about how to keep them healthy and happy. For many of us, that now includes a regular flea and worm treatment for our cats and dogs to prevent any nasty infestations.

This treating of healthy pets with regular doses of parasiticides, i.e. medicines to treat fleas, worms and other parasite infections, as a way to prevent rather than cure infestations is called prophylactic treatment as opposed to reactive treatment. This approach has the benefit that, since it can prevent infestations before they start, it also has a good chance of preventing the unpleasant complications that can sometimes arise from pet parasite infections, such as such as flea allergy dermatitis or disease spread (Murphy and Wright, 2020). This seems quite sensible, but could this approach be harming the environment and our wildlife?

It’s well known by now that pesticides used on crop fields have negative effects on wildlife and the environment (e.g. Sánchez-Bayo, 2021). Neonicotinoids, in particular, are now notorious for their deadly impact on insects and bees in particular, which earned them a ban from use in agriculture by the European Union in 2018 (European Commission, 2023). However, what many of us may not know is that many of those same pesticides that can no longer be used in agriculture are still allowed to be used in other settings, including in pet parasiticides. This decision has been justified by the reasoning that so little of these pesticides is used per pet and even less will reach the outside environment, so the threat to the environment must be very small and not worth worrying about.

However, a recent review of the research around pet parasiticides by Preston-Allen and their team from the Grantham Institute, shows that this assumption is incorrect and our fleaing and worming treatments present a real danger to wildlife, and freshwater habitats in particular. They point out that imidacloprid, one of the most popular pet parasiticides as well as a neonicotinoid banned for agricultural use, was found at toxic levels in two thirds UK rivers surveyed in a recent study (Perkins et al, 2021). Given that these chemicals are no longer used in agriculture, the most likely source is from our pets. Research looking into how pet parasiticides might get into our freshwater habitats indicated that wastewater, i.e from our drains and our washing machines, is the main route, but that shedding of pet hair, pet urine and outdoor swimming are also causes (Preston-Allen et al, 2023, Diepens et al, 2023).

Once they have made it into the environment and into our ponds, lakes and rivers, these chemicals can have devastating impacts on wildlife. These parasiticides are designed to kill invertebrates and this includes our freshwater insects. The research shows that they are deadly to many species of freshwater invertebrates, and they can also have serious negative effects on other animals, including fish, birds and mammals (Preston-Allen et al, 2023). Not all of these animals die from the parasiticides, but they may be impacted in other ways. For example, one study showed that fish with pet parasiticides in their water swim slower and lower in the water, which makes it harder for them to forage for food and easier for predators to catch them (Domingues et al, 2016). Effects like these can impact on the relationships between species and damage the overall health of our ecosystems.

Not only does the current prophylactic approach to pet parasiticides pose a threat to the environment and our wildlife, but there are also concerns it will lead to parasites developing resistance to these drugs (Nind and Mosedale, 2022). This is analogous to the issue of antibiotic resistance, where overuse of some drugs leads to the diseases that we want to target becoming resistant to antibiotics due to overexposure, making it harder to treat these infections (e.g. GLASS Report, 2022). If we keep overusing these pet parasiticides, it is highly likely that these parasites we are aiming to prevent will become resistant and treating infestations in the future will be much more challenging.  

So, what can we as pet owners do?

The key recommendation from the researchers is to start treating these issues reactively instead of prophylactically if you can. This means checking our pets regularly for any signs they may have fleas or worms and seeking vet treatment when it arises, instead of regularly dosing healthy pets with parasiticides. This might not be the ideal solution for everyone as the risks from infestations are higher for some people, such as those with pets that are more vulnerable to complications from fleas or owners who are immunocompromised. So, we should all individually evaluate the level of risk we and our pets face to determine the best approach for us that balances our needs against the environmental impact of these parasiticides.   

As well as aiming to limit the amount of parasiticide treatments we use through a return to reactive treatment, we can aim to reduce the amount of these chemicals that leak into the environment when we do use them. This might mean keeping your cat inside for a few days after applying a spot-on treatment, or not washing your pets bedding as frequently when your pets have been treated, as these are both ways parasiticides can make their way into the environment (Preston-Allen et al, 2023). Another key step we should all try to take is being careful to keep our dogs out of streams and other water bodies when they’ve been treated for parasites recently. It is best to try to avoid letting dogs in wild water bodies in general, as they can stir up and disturb the organisms and plants living there, but especially when they have just been treated for parasiticides as they can wash off into the water (froglife, 2022).

 

References

Diepens, N.J., Belgers, D., Buijse, L., Roessink, I., (2023) Pet dogs transfer veterinary medicines to the environment. Science of The Total Environment. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.159550.

Domingues, I., Oliveira, R., Soares, Amorim, M.V.M., et al. (2016). Effects of ivermectin on Danio rerio: a multiple endpoint approach: behaviour, weight and subcellular markers. Ecotoxicology. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-015-1607-5.

European Commission, (2023). Neonicitinoids, https://food.ec.europa.eu/plants/pesticides/approval-active-substances/renewal-approval/neonicotinoids_en,  accessed 15/12/2023

Froglife, (2022). #pawsagainstponds Campaign, https://www.froglife.org/2022/03/22/pawsagainstponds-campaign/,  accessed 15/12/2023

Global antimicrobial resistance and use surveillance system (GLASS) report, (2022). Geneva: World Health Organization. Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.

Kantar/Soulor Consulting, (2023). online survey with 8,901 respondents, https://www.ukpetfood.org/information-centre/statistics/uk-pet-population.html

Murphy, D, Wright, I., (2020). Value of using preventive pet parasiticides. The Veterinary Record. Feb 29;186(8):252. doi: 10.1136/vr.m727.

Nind, F., Mosedale, P., (2022). Antiparasitic Resistance. BSAVA Guide To The Use Of Veterinary Medicines. https://www.bsavalibrary.com/content/chapter/10.22233/9781905319862.chap20?crawler=true&mimetype=application/pdf

Perkins, R., Whitehead, M., Civil, W., Goulson, D., (2021). Potential role of veterinary flea products in widespread pesticide contamination of English rivers. Science of The Total Environment. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.143560.

Preston-Allen, R.G.G., Albini, D., Barron, L., Collins, T., Dumbrell, A., Duncalf-Youngson, H., Jackson, M., Johnson, A., Perkins, R., Prentis, A., Spurgeon, D., Stasik, N., Wells, C. and Woodward, G., (2023). Are urban areas hotspots for pollution from pet parasiticides? Grantham Institute Briefing. note #15. Doi: https://doi.org/10.25561/102699

Sánchez-Bayo F., (2021). Indirect Effect of Pesticides on Insects and Other Arthropods. Toxics. Jul 30;9(8):177. doi: 10.3390/toxics9080177.