The Scientist - USA (2020-01 & 2020-02)

14 THE SCIENTIST | the-scientist.com

Notebook

NEWS AND ANALYSIS

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2020

Island Frog

Rescue

L

uke Jones spent the early eve-

ning of July 12 last year crouched

in several inches of dusty ash in

a secluded region of Montserrat’s trop-

ical dry forest. After gently unzipping

three nylon tents and laying their flaps

flat to the ground, the program coor-

dinator for Mountain Chicken Reintro-

duction and his team waited silently in

a moonlit clearing for hordes of giant

frogs to leap to freedom.

After 30 minutes of waiting, it

became clear that the frogs, commonly

known as mountain chickens (Leptodac-

tylus fallax), were not going to emerge

in the triumphant cavalry the research-

ers had anticipated. It had been 10

years since the amphibians’ ancestors

had lived on the Caribbean island; the

frogs in the tents were more accustomed

to small biosecure homes in Jersey and

London Zoos in the UK than to the

25-square-meter, semi-wild enclosure

waiting for them outside. When rustling

the tents failed to encourage the frogs to

hop into their new world, the research-

ers gently tipped the 14 animals onto the

forest floor.

Although it wasn’t the striking

entrance that the team had antici-

pated, what followed was spectacular,

Jones says. As the frogs sat blending

into their surroundings, a sudden del-

uge of warm rain welcomed the moun-

tain chickens home. One frog started

calling, and then the next. For the first

time in years, the atmosphere rippled

with the enchanting sounds of these

amphibians, which, weighing up to a

kilogram each, were once apex preda-

tors on the island.

This frog release—one of two such

efforts Jones oversaw that summer—

SKIN TEST: Mountain chicken frogs are being

monitored for signs of fungal disease on the

Caribbean island of Montserrat.

JENNIFER PARKER