B.C. Frogwatch Program
Perhaps you've heard frogs chorusing in the spring or been fascinated by tadpoles in a
pond. Perhaps as a child you carried a frog in your pocket, or had one in your classroom at
school. People are fascinated by frogs and toads, and these little creatures can tell
us a great deal without uttering so much as a "ribbit". In their wetland homes,
frogs are very sensitive to changes in the environment.
Maybe you have heard something about the concern among scientists about
disappearing amphibians. Populations of frogs and toads all over the world
have disappeared or declined, and naturally people are worried. To find out
what is happening to our froggy friends, volunteer naturalists everywhere
are keeping records of where and when they see amphibians.
BC Frogwatch is a program to collect information on frog and toad
populations in British Columbia. Frogwatching is a great project for
school groups, or for adult naturalists. We need your help to find
out how healthy BC's frog and toad populations are - the more eyes and
ears out there finding frogs, the better!
In 2002, we added Tiger Salamanders and Long-toed Salamanders to our
program, and will add the other salamanders later. We have also added
Western Painted Turtles and the introduced Slider Turtle. We know
turtles aren't amphibians, but we'd really appreciate it if our Frogwatchers
could let us know where they see them!
In this site you will find information on identifying amphibians,
surveying for frogs and toads, and reporting your findings. There are
lists of the amphibians to be found in each area of BC, so you can
just click on a map to see who lives near you. There are lots of links to sites
on amphibian biology. We hope you
will enjoy the site and decide to join us Frogwatching.
The Frogwatch program is partnered with the Habitat Conservation
Trust Fund (HCTF), the Ecosystems Branch of the BC Ministry of
Environment (MoE), the Conservation Data Centre
of the BC Ministry of Sustainable Resource Management (SRM), and the
Ecological Monitoring and Assessment Network (EMAN). We also work
closely with members of the Federation of BC Naturalists (BC Nature), with the folks at
the Community Mapping
Network who developed our mapping site, and with BC Wetlandkeepers and
Wild BC.
And, of course, with all our volunteer Frogwatchers.
HCTF has funded the development of this program. MoE and EMAN will
receive the information and make it available for amphibian conservation.
Biologists, naturalists, teachers and students, and people who just plain
like amphibians are all working together, and sharing their information
across
Canada.
