The growling call of the southern bell frog [Litoria raniformis] is booming once again after the endangered species nearly disappeared from some wetlands along the Murrumbidgee River in southern New South Wales, Australia.
Charles Sturt University (CSU) scientists have been monitoring the endangered frog in wetlands that have been the focus of environmental watering programs. CSU Associate Professor Skye Wassens said they were finding hundreds of frogs in some wetlands.
"It's actually sometimes hard to walk in some of our best sites for all the southern bell frogs," Professor Wassens said. "We're starting to see them also basking during the day, so they're really becoming quite abundant."
It marks a huge turnaround for the endangered native frog that struggled to survive the millennium drought.
Not only were numbers booming in those key wetlands, Professor Wassens said southern bell frogs were on the move. "We're also seeing bell frogs turning back up and arriving at some of our restored wetlands in the mid-Murrumbidgee," she said.
"What we suspect here is that southern bell frogs have been utilising irrigation infrastructure, and have been strongholding or seeking refuge in those areas, and they are now moving back and recolonising. People might have noticed even in this rainy weather if you are driving around Coleambally or in the lower Murrumbidgee, massive numbers of the frogs starting to move across the roads."
Read more: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-02-08/endangered-frog-recorded-in-the-murrumbidgee-in-large-numbers/13126976
