Regulating live trade could help prevent amphibian extinctions from chytridiomycosis

• On September 9, 2009, Defenders of Wildlife filed two detailed petitions – one with the Department of the Interior and the other with the Department of Agriculture – urging them to immediately regulate live amphibian imports in the pet, food, scientific and live bait trades to block the deadly amphibian pathogen Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, known as “Bd” or as the “chytrid fungus”. The disease poses a major threat to native amphibians, having already driven numerous frog species to extinction worldwide.

• Live amphibian imports are currently unregulated, creating excessive and unnecessary risk that the Bd pathogen will continue to enter, spread within and be shipped out of the United States. This unregulated trade – primarily for pet use and as live animals for consumption as frog legs – threatens the survival of many amphibians, including dozens of U.S. and foreign species listed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service under the Endangered Species Act.

• Prominent amphibian experts have endorsed these petitions, which provide key factual and legal analysis on how to tackle this emerging epidemic.

WASHINGTON (August 9, 2009) Peter T. Jenkins, director of international conservation for Defenders of Wildlife, urges regulation of live amphibian imports to help stem the spread of Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis:

“It is critical that the U.S. follow the latest international animal health standards to ensure that the massive volumes of live amphibian imports do not continue to carry this deadly disease. Frogs and salamanders worldwide are going extinct due to Bd infections, but we can help them now by cleaning up this trade. We urge the Secretaries of the Interior and Agriculture to quickly approve the petitions we filed today.”

LINKS:
Read Defenders’ petition to the U.S. Department of the Interior.
Read Defenders’ petition to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Read more about Defenders’ work to safeguard amphibians.
Read Broken Screens, Defenders’ report on improving the regulation of live animal imports.

Defenders of Wildlife is dedicated to the protection of all native animals and plants in their natural communities. With more than 1 million members and activists, Defenders of Wildlife is a leading advocate for innovative solutions to safeguard our wildlife heritage for generations to come.

In terms of its effect on biodiversity, chytridiomycosis is quite possibly the worst disease in recorded history. The disease, caused by a pathogenic chytrid fungus, has caused amphibian population declines in Australia, South America, North America, Central America, New Zealand, Europe, and Africa, and is likely responsible for over 100 species extinctions since the 1970′s.

While chytridiomycosis has become a major focus of amphibian research worldwide, few herpetologists have any background in the laboratory techniques necessary to detect the chytrid fungus, and training classes are rare. Quantitative PCR (qPCR) is the most technologically advanced method of diagnosing chytrid infections, and the ability to perform qPCR in one’s own laboratory would both expedite the processing of samples and decrease the costs incurred by sending samples to private laboratories for diagnosis.

SAVE THE FROGS! has now made publicly and freely available a detailed protocol for the detection and quantification of Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis. This is the most in-depth protocol of its kind in existence, and can be found, along with accompanying slideshow, videos and supplementary materials at:
http://savethefrogs.com/chytrid/qpcr.html

The slideshow, videos, webpage and other materials were developed as part of a free course offered by SAVE THE FROGS! and the Herpetological Circle of Panama. The course, entitled “Instruction and application of quantitative PCR molecular techniques for the study of amphibian epidemics”, took place at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama City on October 5th-9th 2009, and was attended by 25 scientists from Panama, Colombia, and Costa Rica. Amphibian population in all three countries have experienced severe declines in numbers due to the chytrid fungus. This course was taught in Spanish by SAVE THE FROGS! Founder & Executive Director Dr. Kerry Kriger, with the valuable assistance of Vicky Flechas of Colombia’s Universidad de Los Andes. This course effectively doubled the number of scientists on the planet capable of using quantitative PCR for the diagnosis of amphibian chytrid infections.

We plan to hold another such course in Bogota, Colombia in November of 2010.
http://savethefrogs.com/chytrid/qpcr.html

Are humans eating frogs to extinction? What should we do about it?

Read the new Conservation Biology article by Warkentin et al. entitled “Eating Frogs to Extinction”