Fences erected on mountain to save one of Australia's rarest frogs
A naturalist who discovered a fingernail-sized frog on a remote Queensland mountain is now racing to save the species from extinction three decades later.
The scientist who discovered Australia’s rarest frog as a teenager is now in a race to save his fingernail-sized discovery from extinction on a remote Far North mountain.
Thirty years after Dr Andrew Dennis discovered the mountain-top nursery frog after a series of Mount Lewis expeditions with his cousin, he is on a mission to save it from extinction.
About the size of a fingernail and giving birth to live young, the amphibian is one of Australia’s rarest frogs and can be found in the remote and stunning wilderness near Julatten, northwest of Cairns.
“We were coming up here looking at everything but we noticed there were so many different frogs we couldn’t identify,” the Terrain NRM project leader said.
“In the dark of night with a little headlamp, raining, because that’s when the frogs are calling most, you’re crawling around in the leaf litter listening to a call.
“You can identify every frog in the country based on its call... we could tell which call was what frog, except up here. It was too confusing.”
Follow-up research revealed their discovery was not only endemic to Mount Lewis, it was only found in the last 300m of elevation.
Since its discovery, global warming has pushed the tiny frog higher up the mountain.
Roaming pigs are now threatening the final patches of habitat.
“At least 30 per cent of the forest floor is getting churned up by pigs, which is reducing the habitat availability to the frog,” Dr Dennis said.
“In Australia, the pigs established in the lowlands and the savannahs quite quickly... now they might be establishing in the mountaintops.”
Terrain NRM, in partnership with the West Yalinji Rangers, have created fenced and unfenced quadrants with audio recorders to see if management could help save the species.
If more croaking frogs are recorded within the enclosures, the trial may open the door for more widespread strategies to be rolled out.
Ranger Archie Tana said the project was not just about saving one frog, it was about protecting the entire ecosystem.
“It affects the entire biodiversity of the rainforest,” he said.
“They all have their spot in this place, they all do their job, it’s all interconnected.
“Pigs are a massive problem but we are actually out here doing something about it.”
Mr Leaver has spent the last eight years working as a ranger.
He said the project showed how critical it was for his people to be on the ground leading conservation efforts.
“Being out here has healed me,” he said. “It’s hard to get the kids out of the city to come out but that’s my passion.
“Getting these young kids on the straight and narrow because I was one of them hardheads.
“It’s good for us to get out there and start doing it our self, controlling and organising this kind of stuff.”
But the researchers are in a race against time.
Mount Lewis has already lost three species of endemic frogs in the past few decades.
Mr Dennis said the streams didn’t sound like they used to.
“It’s nice to be trying to look after this little frog that I found but it’s also scary and nerve-wracking that it could go extinct,” he said.
“I went to university to do a PHD on a frog on this mountain but it went extinct before I got the chance to study it.
“The streams around here already don’t sound like they used to... people should care because these are very special little frogs.”
Originally published as Fences erected on mountain to save one of Australia's rarest frogs
Daughter warns of potting mix danger after dad’s death
