Hi Folks,
Something very interesting happened recently and I wanted the input of the experts on here as to whether I am interpreting this correctly. I was recently walking in a rather small patch of woods in a suburban neighborhood in a neighboring county. This patch of woods is reputed to be heavily polluted, a former dumping site where there are supposedly residual heavy metals and polyaromatic hydrocarbons present. I was interested in taking a look at the property and maybe giving it a quick survey next year to see what might be there, since, again, it is supposedly very polluted. I actually found two redbacked salamanders and heard some peeper vocalizations there, but most interesting to me was finding a wood frog. It was near a standing pool of water that looked a bit stagnant and had a film on top of it, but was the only body of water present and the only indication of anything that could have been a vernal pool. The alleged dumping took place 2 decades ago, so I am wondering if a) successful cleanup efforts took place, or b) the wood frog is more resilient to pollution than I suspected. This is very interesting to me and it would be very encouraging to me to find out that wood frogs are a good environmental indicator and that this site is not as polluted as suspected. Could anyone share some info about this?
Thanks for your input!
MCHerper
Wood Frogs as Environmental Indicators?
Moderator: Scott Waters
Re: Wood Frogs as Environmental Indicators?
PM Matt J, he did his MS thesis on this topic.
Re: Wood Frogs as Environmental Indicators?
Will do, thanks!
Re: Wood Frogs as Environmental Indicators?
Something to consider is that just because an animal is found in a certain habitat does not necessarily mean that it is good habitat.
Some habitats are better than others. Really good habitat may produce more individuals of a species than that area can support and some of those individuals may spill over into neighboring, "crappy" habitat. This is the concept of source-sink dynamics used in metapopulation ecology. A "source" is a good habitat area that produces a surplus and a "sink" is crappy habitat that animals move into but conditions are not optimal for reproduction.
If I were you, I would go back this summer and see if you can find recent metamorph wood frogs in the area. I suspect that the eggs and tadpoles are much more susceptible to environmental contaminates and the presence of metamorphs would be a much better indicator of a healthy habitat.
Some habitats are better than others. Really good habitat may produce more individuals of a species than that area can support and some of those individuals may spill over into neighboring, "crappy" habitat. This is the concept of source-sink dynamics used in metapopulation ecology. A "source" is a good habitat area that produces a surplus and a "sink" is crappy habitat that animals move into but conditions are not optimal for reproduction.
If I were you, I would go back this summer and see if you can find recent metamorph wood frogs in the area. I suspect that the eggs and tadpoles are much more susceptible to environmental contaminates and the presence of metamorphs would be a much better indicator of a healthy habitat.