Pool Frogs

Alex Re

Hello, welcome to on wildlife. I'm your host, Alex Re. On this podcast, we bring the wild to you, we take you on a journey into the life of a different animal every week. And I guarantee you, you're gonna come out if you're knowing more about your favorite animal than you did before. This week is really exciting because I had the opportunity to speak to Ben King, who is the recovery officer at the amphibian and reptile Conservation Trust for the animal that we're going to be talking about. today. We're talking about a frog that you probably haven't heard of, unless you live in the UK. So grab some boots, because we're heading to the palms of England to talk about pool frogs.

You can identify a pool frog from other types of frogs by looking at their patterns. They have a pale stripe that runs down their back which other frogs don't have. And if you want to see a really great picture of one, check out our Instagram page at on wildlife. And pool frogs are also really interesting animals because they were once thought to be extinct. They were declared extinct in 1995. But now we know that that's not true, but their numbers are still extremely low. And luckily Ben and the amphibian and reptile Conservation Trust are working to recover their populations. Ben has his master's degree in Zoo conservation biology, and has worked on the conservation of multiple other species throughout his life. So I can't wait for you guys to hear him talk about not only pool frogs, but just conservation in general. So stick around for that interview after the break.

The person that I want to recognize in this week's episode of notable figures in science is Benjamin Banneker. He was born in 1731. And his mother was a freed slave. He was kind of a jack of all trades when it came to science, studying everything from astronomy to insects. He used mathematical calculations to predict the timing of eclipses. And he wrote multiple almanacs that showed his calculations. When he died, most of his work was destroyed in a fire, but one of his journals was able to be recovered. In this journal, he wrote about how cicadas emerge in large numbers every 17 years. And he also made observations about honeybee behaviors. But one of his greatest accomplishments was that he actually built the first clock in America. He was one of the greatest scientists of his time. And if you want to learn more about Benjamin Banneker, or this series in general, check out on wildlife.org. Okay, we're back. Here's my interview with Ben King. Hi, Ben, how are you doing? I'm doing great. Thank you. I'm great. I'm so excited. I'm so happy you were able to come on to the podcast. Thank you so much again, for coming on. No, honestly, it's a real pleasure. Thank you. Thank you. Awesome. So first, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you became interested in pool frogs?

Ben King

Yeah, so I'm an early career conservation. So I'm quite young. But I'm in Britain. So obviously, you're American. Um, I have a background in many zoos. So I have a master's in Zoo conservation, from the University of Plymouth. That is linked with petting zoo, environmental Wildlife Park, and the wild planet trust now. Right now I am the ark. bullfrog recovery project officer. The reason I'm interested in bullfrogs is because of their whole story. They, as we will talk later on the they went extinct from Britain back in the 90s. And I'm really interested because it's been really successful reintroduce them. And it allows me to combine both mazouz knowledge and execute conservation, with real conservation impacts and releases to the wild.

Alex Re

Awesome. Yeah. And I really can't wait to get talking about that. So we'll definitely talk about that later on in the podcast. So you also work with the amphibian and reptile Conservation Trust, like you were talking about? So can you just explain your, your role a little bit more there?

Ben King

Yeah, of course. Um, my role right now, I only started a couple months ago, but because of the nature of the project, my role is constantly changing and fails. Because when people say it's no two days the same, it's because everything's changing all the time. I feel So my main sort of priorities are sullied on the captive rearing of tadpoles. So this is obviously for the pool folks. Right now we're everything is going to start and we are waiting for them to spawn, so that we can take the eggs and try and do our best to raise as many little folks as possible. So right now that is that is a big part of my job is preparing a whole facility. Right now I'm trying to liaise with volunteers to make sure that we have the help to actually do it. And then when time comes, we'll be actually head starting looking after the samples. The other main task I have is monitoring at the science. So currently, there's two reintroduction sites. There, we're doing count surveys, and we will be doing cap surveys and capture surveys of the bullfrogs, they've actually just started to emerge from hibernation last couple weeks, which is great, great to the amount. They start heating and cooling as well. And then in the future, as I say everything's gonna be changing. So in the future, obviously, very soon, we're hoping that we'll be secure on spawn. We also really are trying to find future science or reductions. Right now, as I say there's only two sides, which is a really successful, but we would like to expand the range of these frogs. And we're also looking into other exit conservation organizations such as soon, we'll see how we can get them involved. And then finally, it's communications. So trying to explain why it's important and reach out to wider audiences.

Alex Re

Awesome. And it must be so amazing to kind of just be a part of that reintroduction process and actually going out into the field and helping them be introduced into the wild. So I can't imagine how great that must be. Yeah, honestly, I

Ben King

felt really, this job is is really good fun, as well as knowing you're doing a really important job. So I really couldn't hope for a better job right now.

Alex Re

That's, that's great. And you were talking about how you're actually getting to go into the fields. So frogs are known for their meeting calls do pool frogs have a recognizable noise that they make that you can really identify and know that this is definitely a pool frog?

Ben King

Um, well, I've got a little clip here, if you'd like to hear I don't know how good it will be an audio.

Alex Re

Yeah, absolutely. Really good.

Ben King

It's just really distinctive. It's really nice. When we obviously one of the reasons we monitoring other entities as well, is to make sure that as we're out there, we know when the portfolio starts to emerge, and when they stop reading. So when we first heard our first thought for me and Emily, my project assistant, and we were just sat eating lunch, and all of a sudden, we heard a calling right behind us, which is really strange, but really cool

Alex Re

that it always comes when you're least expecting it.

Ben King

I don't know how the weather has been in America right now. But this spring here is being really sort of unusually cold. And that's for Britain. Yeah, and frogs are emerging slightly later than we're expecting. But like I say, it's great to see them out and about.

Alex Re

The reason why pool frogs need warmer weather is because they're ectotherms, meaning that their body temperature relies on the outside temperature,

Ben King

this sort of interesting because who really like hot temperatures, but because of that it makes it really nice that we can pick and choose when we do our surveys, the best days with nice days. So if it's raining and cold, we might go out and see absolutely nothing. So there's not much point if you wait until the nice days and go out there. Get on with the other work that you can do.

Alex Re

Well, that really just works out for you. That's really I do and how do you identify a pool frog from any other type of frog?

Ben King

Yeah, so the habitat recall probe is actually quite specific. So it really like this quarter pingo and it's a greatest back in the past on search about 10 to 12,000 years ago, these little fingers were created by the ice reducing. And this basically is ideal habitat where the bullfrog is inhabited. And so they light sort of open habitats that have the appalls generally unique grazing animals that will graze and keep This sort of plan in three trucks down. But it's great if there's surrounding woodlands, which is ideal. This is why we pitch both sites, because they're great for the actual bullfrogs. The other thing with common for obviously, the only other species in Britain of frog is the common frog. And just from its name, it's really obvious that it is really widespread. They're really generous and they're really successful. But they're the common frogs. Latin name is Rana, Rana, temporary, temporary. And basically the temporary beans, they generally light spawn in temporary bonds. And that's basically because there's less aquatic predators for them, and the temples, but the bullfrog much prefers a sort of very permanent bond, it's always gonna be there. And yeah, they're just generally like the deeper, deeper waters.

Alex Re

Oh, okay, that's really interesting. And you were also talking about how they are coming out of hibernation, soon, at least. So how does that process work for pool frogs? How is the hibernation process working for them?

Ben King

As I say they came out a couple of weeks ago. So around the end of April, they generally hibernate though, from October all the way until about this time. And that's just because Britain is really quite cold. So yeah, they've been tucked away or nice and warm. That like I say, they like sort of open habitat, but we've mixed woodland nearby. And this is exactly why the sites we have chosen to reintroduce them have been picked. And this provides a great hibernation site, they can hibernate in the leaf litter. And generally they like it when the pools are within about 250 to 200 meters of the palms. They don't like traveling massively far from the palms. That means it's really easy for them to get back when the breeding season comes around again.

Alex Re

Oh, that's great. And and I never really thought about frogs where they go during the winter time. So it's interesting to know that they do hibernate.

Ben King

Yes. Yeah. Particularly Britain. To be honest. I'm not sure I'm seeing tropical species tone, but here in Britain, yeah, the frog time. It

Alex Re

just gets too cold. Yeah, you're gonna need to. And are there any other cool adaptations that pool frogs have that kind of make them stand out?

Ben King

Oh, yeah. So there's a few little quirks they have. So as we're saying the communication they are actually the only frog in Britain that has two vocal sacs and so it's on either side of their jaw, we sent you a really nice photo of it. Hopefully, you can see it. And these are always whites in a northern bullfrog. Other sort of bullfrogs or other introduced species, it's all colored and it varies, but in a portrait in a northern bullfrog, it is always white. The other thing is, because the hibernate, other common frogs do hibernate come out much earlier in the year and certainly the poor frogs are breeding much later. They also have a spoon clumps are very small, and comparisons come across and about the equivalent of about a Walmart in size. They're quite unusual, because any other amphibians in this country or any other frogs or toads in this country, the eggs are generally black in color, or very dark. Whereas the pool frog has half of its brown dark fish, but the other side is very white and green colored is quite strange, but very distinctive when you see it.

Alex Re

frog eggs need to be in the water for the most part. And they look like big clumps of clear gelatin with black dots inside those black dots are the embryos. And also because they

Ben King

obviously breed later in the year, their tadpoles have very quickly, but they they grow to a much larger size than other frogs. So they can get quite quite chunky, they can get to about eight, eight centimeters when we start. So metamorphosizing into little frog legs.

Alex Re

That's really cool. And are they important to the ecosystems that they live in in any sort of way?

Ben King

It's a really tricky question to answer. Because there's so many factors. I always think of it as how is the species importance, whether ecosystem services and how do they fit inside the ecosystem. So pool frogs, they, they're really important just for the as for any interview, and the real important would be the stability and resilience of ecosystems. So this this partly is down to the food web and the energy dynamics they they have. They're also really important in regulating prey populations. We know at sites there's, they're generally like invertebrate prey, but they also for some reason they like flying insects and Besides me, but we we know, as experienced, there's lots of mosquitoes and midges. So if that controller man, we're more than happy.

Alex Re

Yeah. And the rest of the world is till

Ben King

Yes, exactly. I think any amphibians are doing very much appreciated. But generally, there's so many different sort of aspects that you can look at. And, for example, all these predators and prey that I've just mentioned, they all got their own applications as well, the ecosystem. As I say, Prufrock is sort of lone abundant now and comparison to other amphibians. But though, really, that that makes them really key environmental indicators. So it's really easy to see if the overall population Something is wrong, something's not going right. Luckily, it is going right. But it would be really easy to see if there's anything wrong with the system helpful quality in any way. And obviously, with the proof rocks, specifically, we as a charity with we're trying to recover this species. But in order to do that, we have to have the habitat. And again, this is a massive sort of part of the whole ecosystem that we have the healthy habits, we're gonna have healthy movement.

Alex Re

Yeah, absolutely. And it seems like they do a lot. They are a prey species, and they also help to keep other populations down. And without them. It could cause an imbalance in that. foodweb definitely, definitely.

Ben King

I mean, amphibians in general, are really sort of amazing creatures. But, yeah, there's so many sort of applications that could have, for example, many amphibians have sort of biological chemicals that are being used in sort of anti cancer, anti sort of viral compounds that could be written, but you don't know that unless you test on this, which, obviously, I'm not, I'm not suggesting we do test on a really critically endangered species. But you would never know. So yeah, having them is really important, because there's so many potential sort of benefits of having them that you don't fully appreciate until they're gone.

Alex Re

Yeah, and they're not only benefits to the ecosystem, but just like you said to us to use them for own benefit. And going off of that question, pool frogs were once announced to be extinct in the wild in the 90s. So obviously, they're not anymore. So what kind of efforts have you been taking to change that?

Ben King

As I say, the cool frogs are really sort of interesting case study. Because there are a introduced species in Britain. To be honest, the pool frog was always believed to be an invasive species that have been introduced. But back in 2000, as we say, they went extinct in the 90s. But back in 2005, researchers from within Ark, published a paper basically proving that the northern bullfrog was a native species. And basically from this study, it came that Britain wanted to reintroduce bullfrog. So the first reintroduction occurred in 2005. And like I say, all frogs were taken from Sweden, with permission from the Swedish government. They were house screened out there to make sure they weren't going to introduce any diseases. And they were brought back to Norfolk back in East Anglia in the south southeast of England. And since then, they've been breeding the site really well. They've been surviving really well. And I've been really successful. The secondary introduction happens in 2015, at a place called Thomson Coleman, again, in Norfolk, not very far away. And that was actually the last place that northern bullfrogs are known to occur before they went extinct in the 90s. And this was actually done rather than bringing more from Sweden, they frogs at the first site had spawn head started, and it was the young of that that was reintroduced to Thompson common. So how we're planning on doing is actually a proven a proven way of establishing your colonies. During all this time, there's been constant sort of population monitoring to make sure the frogs are doing really well. And there's also disease monitoring, but it's linked with the Institute of zoology at the Zoological Society of London who owns London Zoo. They've been really amazing making sure that everything's we're not introducing any new diseases that could be really harmful to either the populations or other native species. Yeah, I keep saying the sort of first and secondary introductions. As I said, the secondary introductions like is Thompson common. First one is still sort of pitted them because obviously the frogs is so rare. It would be very easy. Even if it's an enthusiastic individual really easy if someone collected a lot of frogs, just because they were really interested or once a keyboard, that would be really easy for them to damage the whole population. And allow is to quite confidential. So yeah, I'm not allowed to say, well, even we refer to it as site x. So, yeah, it is almost ground zero. That is where we're working from, which is Yeah, really exciting. But obviously, there's reasons why we have to be careful.

Alex Re

Yeah, absolutely. That's, that's amazing. And it kind of shows you how, even when you think a population is done extinct, there could still be a way to rehabilitate that population into the habitat that it wants to lived in. It kind of gives me hope for other species as well.

Ben King

Yeah, definitely. Definitely. There was a lot of management work, like say, that was a really quick summary of the whole work that's been done. Yes, so many partners over the years. I wouldn't want to sort of mention lots because obviously, I feel so guilty if I left anyone out. But yeah, it's been a really successful process, I think, yeah, it's a really good case study of how species can be reintroduced. But having said that, it's been really closely monitored. And we are really targeting the northern bullfrogs, which are known to be native, whereas the Continental ones from more Southern Europe, known to not not be so yeah, we want to keep the genetics route. Cool.

Alex Re

Yeah. And that goes to show that it takes a lot of work and planning to do this. So if we really want to make some change, we got to get a lot of people to really care about it. Just like you guys do with the pool frogs?

Ben King

Yeah, definitely. I mean, like to say we're focusing on one specific species, but it's having massive benefits, the whole ecosystem is not, it's not just, we want to save the species for the sake of saving species is a benefit everything, which I think is really great.

Alex Re

Yeah, definitely. So I'm sure a lot of people are hearing this and they're thinking, how can we help bullfrog? So is there anything that the average person can do to help them? Well,

Ben King

as a charity, we are always we are run on donations, we need sort of funding, unfortunately, for the all this great work we can do for free, unfortunately, which would be lovely, because, yeah, it's just not how the world works. Yeah. But when I think more broadly, it's not just the bullfrogs that can be helped by an average person. It's also partly what shouldn't be done. So as I say, we have that sense of biologists at the Institute of zoology, who do all this disease testing, and basically trying to stop any sort of potential disease risk. So just please don't sort of go releasing all your pet probes or sort of Yeah, using a nets in the wild that could be transferring anything to wild populations of frogs. Again, just don't go out collecting a load of unknown sort of endangered species is, is it's really sort of straightforward things. It's just, it's very easy for a few individuals to create quite a large impact.

Alex Re

Yeah, I completely agree. And it's it's really easy just to not try and tamper with what's out in the in the environment you can observe from afar and and enjoy that, but make sure that you're not interfering with anything.

Ben King

No, definitely I'm not saying don't go out is lovely. Honestly, songs in common. The site we released the frogs, they is off public. So the people people generally can't get to the frogs. However, the actual common is a quite a large area, and the frogs, my manager, john Baker, he he's heard frogs calling at ponds that are accessible to locals. So clearly, they are expanding their range. And it's honestly it's amazing to hear them calling and see them. I mean, it's great to sort of get out in nature and sort of really enjoy the benefits that these natural ecosystems bring. It's just being sensible, and not sort of introducing diseases or non sort of native species. For example, there is no American bullfrogs in Britain, which obviously, shouldn't be here, but they've made it somehow.

Alex Re

Yeah, yeah. So some somebody some pet owner probably decided they were going to release their bull dog. Not a great idea.

Ben King

Well, All this obviously is not an ideal result. But again, I don't think anyone no one's heard this maliciously is Yeah. yakob. So understanding all those, which hopefully things like this podcast should help enlighten people help educate.

Alex Re

I hope so. I really hope. So, before you go, where can we find information about the amphibian and reptile Conservation Trust?

Ben King

Yes. So, obviously, we have our website. So it's www dot orc, dash trust org. There's loads of great information. There's all the sort of work we do all the projects, the pool frogs as a specific project page, but there's many other projects run. There's also just general facts and sort of just, there's, there's lots of sort of training and education resources. The other thing is also we have a lot of social media accounts. So we have Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn. Um, so it's great if we can gain support through that.

Alex Re

Yeah, definitely. Everybody should absolutely go check them out. Yeah. And, Ben, thank you so much for coming on to the show. Again, I really learned a lot and I really appreciate you coming on and sharing your knowledge. so brilliant. Thank you very much for having me. Oh, yeah, a few things. You did more than a few. Brilliant. Thank you very much. I don't know about you guys. But that interview really made me want to support conservation efforts. The fact that they were able to start recovering pool frog populations when they were thought to be extinct, makes you really feel like it's never too late to help out. You should absolutely go check out the amphibian and reptile Conservation Trust and frogs everywhere are struggling right now. Which is why you should also check out save the frogs and the amphibian survival Alliance. Thank you so much for coming on this adventure with me as we explored the world of pool frogs. You can find the sources that we use for this podcast and links to organizations that we reference at on wildlife.org. You can also email us with any questions at on wildlife. dot podcast@gmail.com you can follow us on Instagram at en underscore wildlife and on tik tok at on wildlife. Don't forget to tune in next Wednesday for another awesome episode. And that's on wildlife.

Jess Avellino

You can listening to on wildlife with Alex read on wildlife provides general educational information on various topics as a public service, which should not be construed as professional financial real estate tax or legal advice. These are our personal opinions only. Please refer to our full disclaimer policy on our website for full details.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai