Because frogs are so influenced by temperature and humidity – like the fungus – in warm dry years they huddle together and transmit disease between themselves.”ĭr Laura Brannelly, a conservation biologist at the University of Melbourne, studies how frogs cope with climate change and disease. “We also don’t know how the fungus will change and interact with climate change. “It’s theoretically possible that same thing could happen due to climate change, even in Australia,” Rowley said. She said in south-east Asia “deforestation is happening faster than we can discover species in the forest” and the same problem could be hitting frogs in Australia. View image in fullscreen There’s been a decline in crawling frog (pseudophryne guentheri) numbers. However, it’s estimated about 20% of all the likely frog species in Australia have not been named and described in scientific journals. That gives us more time to look at adaptation, but it’s also frightening because people become complacent.”ĭr Jodi Rowley, a frog expert and biologist at the Australian Museum and the University of New South Wales, says there are about 240 known frog species in Australia. ”Ĭlimate change will have a slower impact than the fungus outbreak: “It will be a much more steady process of decline. “In the last four to five years, there have been four or five days that have gone above 32C. “Anything above that, and they die,” he says. Mahoney says some Australian frog species live in high elevation rainforests and cool temperate areas with a thermal maximum of 29C. Can the frogs keep pace with current climate change? We don’t quite know the answer to that.” “The problem then is, how many refuges are there? The effective habitat that’s available is getting smaller and smaller. Mahoney says all frogs have a different “critical thermal maximum”, a temperature above which they die, so they have to find places to hide and stay cool and moist.
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