About This Project

Ask the Scientists

What is the context of this research?

We know from our previous work that amphibians may in fact be adapting to the pollutants that car traffic is leaving in roadside ponds. Some of our data suggest that animals from roadside ponds may develop longer legs, which may facilitate faster road crossings. In addition, eggs from roadside ponds have higher hatching success in those ponds compared to eggs that are transplanted to roadside ponds from the woodlands. This suggests that frogs from roadside ponds may have a small survival advantage in these environments. However, they still survive poorly overall compared with frogs from pristine environments, meaning that the jury is still out as to whether roadside ponds are contributing to amphibian declines.

What is the significance of this project?

Amphibians are highly threatened. They depend on having clean water in which to lay eggs, and on having suitable forested habitat in which to grow into adults. We already know that roadside ponds have higher concentrations of salt (from de-icing agents used in winter) as well as toxicants like cadmium and other automotive pollutants. Although at first blush, it would seem that these ponds should necessarily be terrible for frogs, our preliminary results suggest the possibility that frogs are actually adapting to some of these conditions, and may be on an evolutionary path towards long-term survival. However, results are mixed and suggest that only some aspects of frog life are suitable to roadside ponds. Critical experiments have yet to be performed before we can predict their fate.

What are the goals of the project?

We aim to perform a reciprocal transplant experiment in which egg masses from both woodland and roadside ponds will be split in half and either left in their natal pond, or transplanted to a new alternative (woodland or roadside) environment. This will allow us to follow the respective growth, development, swimming performance, jumping performance, and mating success of individuals in each environment, and to measure the degree to which frogs from each environment are adapted to their natal ponds.

We hope to understand the degree to which roadside environments negatively impact these frogs (if at all) relative to frogs living in pristine environments. We hope that our results will allow us to inform conservation planners when considering the fate of endemic wild life.