Disappearing frogs!

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pollygog
Posts: 617
Joined: Mon Jan 19, 2009 6:26 pm

Disappearing frogs!

Post by pollygog »

Read an interesting article from N.G magazine regarding the worlds disappearing frog population and a disturbing fact is one killer disease, Ranavirus (Rana is latin for frog) was discovered in britain in the 60's but was mainly confined to the south of G,B apparently up to the 80's. Its now endemic and has led to the loss of 4/5ths of British frog population.
Tough on the frogs I hear but what do we koi keepers care about the welfare of frogs! ------think again and worry!----------The virus evolved from a fish virus and started attacking amphibians frogs toads newts and now salamanders and turtles, even crayfish are now found to be carriers and victims of a related disease a fungus disease called Chytrid.
For the more technical minded the Ranaviruses are nucleocytoplasmic or large D.N.A viruses Ranavirus is one of five genera of viruses within the nucleocytoplasmic group, like the megalocytiviruses which are an emerging group of closely related ds D.N.A viruses these cause virulent systemic infections in a wide variety of wild and cultured fish both fresh and saltwater.They are still evolving and what goes around will surely come around.
Watch this space
pollygog
Posts: 617
Joined: Mon Jan 19, 2009 6:26 pm

Re: Disappearing frogs!

Post by pollygog »

According to North East Wales Wildlife (Newwildlife) group the Chytrid fungus has recently been recorded in the Talacre reserve, this is serious news as the reserve has North Wales only colony of natterjack toads. Will follow this up.
pollygog
Posts: 617
Joined: Mon Jan 19, 2009 6:26 pm

Re: Disappearing frogs!

Post by pollygog »

Since the sterile frogspawn and consequent lack of tadpoles in Feb 2013 I have been conducting a series of experiments on the amphibian population in my ponds and garden
During and just after the poor spawning in late Feb/early March I noticed several frogs with a red rash on skin particularly around their stomach,vent and hind legs region and knowing that frogs can carry 'Trich' I was concerned for my koi.
I summoned King Kenny of Rhyl with his microscope and slides and he confirmed that my koi were infected with Trichodena. I immediately treated the fish and pond with Formalin/Malachite green (FMG) followed up in April with a big water change and then treatment with Potassium Permanganate
I also made sure all the frogs (and later toads and newts) were treated with same as potential carriers.
This actually had farther reaching consequences than I envisaged at the time :!:
The result of treatments I'm sure were that this year 2014 I had the largest amount of viable frogspawn ever and literally thousands of tadpoles; far too many to feed despite putting new wildlife pond in down bottom of garden (by the way tadpoles love koi food)
I gave away large amounts of tadpoles to five new wildlife pond owners this spring to give some a fighting chance and to increase the population

To be continued soon
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