Spotted Frogs Make a Big Splash at Utah WRP Project

PARK CITY — The Swaner Nature Preserve is projected to be a hoppin' place in the coming years.

Wildlife biologists, conservationists, residents and media gathered here Wednesday to witness the first repatriation (reintroduction) project of Columbia spotted frogs in the United States. What began as an effort to keep the frogs off the endangered species list has now yielded to bring several hundred back into a habitat where they once thrived.

"I've been collecting frogs since I was 3 years old," said Paula Swaner-Sargetakis, Swaner Nature Preserve chairwoman. "So, to have something like this going on at the preserve is an amazing thing for me."

Learn about the Wetlands Reserve Program and other Farm Bill programs.

The preserve entered an agreement with the Natural Resources Conservation Service several years ago in order to receive technical assistance for conservation of 530 acres of the privately owned wetlands. This easement and restoration project was made possible through the 2002 Farm Bill's Wetlands Reserve Program.

"The Wetlands Reserve Program is a voluntary program that allows private landowners to enter into a conservation easement that protects the functions and values of the wetland sites, and it also provides an opportunity for them to restore those functions and values," said state conservationist Sylvia Gillen.

A conservation team worked to prepare the land for the acceptance of the frogs, which were native to this area of Utah 50 years ago. Irrigation ditches were closed off to allow water to pond and pool. These efforts created wetland vegetation and the possibility of a flourishing wetland ecosystem, including the Columbia spotted frog.

Krissy Wilson, an aquatic biologist for the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources said certain criteria must be met for frogs to live in nature.

"The location must be a persistent water source, with water year-round," she said. "It must also be a deep area providing refuge for the frogs, both in summer and in winter." Other specifications for a frog pond, she said, include emergent vegetation and significant in-water structures that allow for hiding.

A Brigham Young University professor wanted to use the ponds in an experimental manner to determine the most efficient and cost-effective methods for future repatriation efforts. Dr. Mark Belk and a team of graduate students from the Zoology Department at BYU are conducting the research, which will expand the range of the Columbia spotted frog along the Wasatch Front.

Belk and his team placed 5,000 tadpoles contained in cages into three ponds on the preserve property last May. They have monitored them closely and fed them a diet of ground-up spinach. The cages opened Wednesday were producing better than a 50 percent survival rate, he said.

"That's much better than you'd get with just a natural population," Belk said. "So to see these frogs — they're a good size and they seem to be surviving pretty well (in this area). It's touchy because guaranteeing that water is going to be there is a hard thing to do in the state of Utah, especially during drought."

The conditions of Utah's dry climate is what forced the spotted frog into near endangerment. The frogs lost most of their natural habitat to extensive human development and land use, but in addition, many of the lands they once lived on dried up.

"It's nice to know we're helping to bring these remarkable animals home," said Cindee Jensen, assistant director of the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.
The frogs are expected to be mating two years from now and will continue to be monitored and studied to assess their survivability, said Alyssa Charrier, a biology student working on the BYU project.

"The field work is great," Charrier said. "It's really what I want to be doing."
Students and staff measured the frogs from "snout to vent," and then weighed and marked them for future studies and tracking capability. The frogs were injected subcutaneously with a colored elastomer product that enters as a liquid and then hardens inside the fatty tissue of the frog's leg, where vital organs are not at risk. Almost 400 frogs were released into the ponds.

Belk said predators are not a worry of his and will help to provide the frogs with an even more natural environment.

"They can be eaten by almost anything whose mouth they can fit into," he said. "It's important, though, because the population evolved with predators. It makes for a healthy ecosystem."

The success of this project will determine if similar efforts can prove to be beneficial to the threatened population of Columbia spotted frogs.

"It's a rare breath of fresh air," Jensen said, "and a welcome glimpse of an open space in an area that is facing tremendous development pressure."

Story by Chris Bergin, Deseret Morning News.

IMAGES: (Top) A group from Brigham Young University collects Columbia spotted frogs at Swaner Nature Preserve near Park City. (Bottom) Project participants hope to return hundreds of the frogs back into a Utah habitat where they once thrived.