AB Press x2: Sometimes it's hard to be amphibian

EDMONTON JOURNAL (Alberta) 10 July 08 All that slithers is gold to reptile-loving researcher; U of A grad student monitors effect of rapid urbanization on fragile species (Clara Ho)
Edmonton: When Brett Scheffers was five, his mother found him splashing around in a bathtub with assorted frogs, snakes, turtles and leeches from a nearby lake.
"She screamed, 'What are you doing!'" Scheffers said with a laugh. "I guess amphibians and reptiles have been my absolute fascination since I was a child."
Now 24 and a graduate student in biological sciences at the University of Alberta, he still keeps an eye on slippery, slithery creatures.
Scheffers will spend his summer monitoring man-made wetlands around the city to study the effects of rapid urban development on amphibians.
In accordance with the city's conservation plan, wetlands that are removed or damaged by development must be replaced or restored.
But Scheffers is concerned that many of the newly constructed wetlands are not ecologically equivalent to the natural ones lost in land development.
"That's why I want to know if we remove a wetland and we have to construct an artificial one, where is the best place?" he said Wednesday, while monitoring a man-made wetland site in the Blackmud Creek neighbourhood.
"And what are we doing well and what can we do better in constructing this new wetland?"
Every day, Scheffers sets out with his dog, Guinness, to keep track of man-made wetland sites in the city, checking pitfall traps and conducting habitat surveys and tadpole counts.
This will help Scheffers track the amphibians' movements to determine what parts of the landscape they choose, whether they head to terrestrial lands to forage for food and whether they thrive in these man-made wetland environments.
Since Scheffers started tracking in March, he noticed that many frogs are "aborting" their migration process because the surrounding urban environment stands in their way. Frogs complete their migration when they move from the wetland to an adjacent forest patch, he said.
"But when they try to migrate to get away from the wetland to forage and eat, they can't because they reach the urban environment and it's too intricate, too dangerous and too dry."
As a result, many frogs go back to live in the wetland area. Sometimes, upon their return, the wetlands have dried up, giving them little chance to survive.
These constant environmental changes are causing frog numbers to decline at an alarming rate, Scheffers said. Geological records show that one species of amphibian becomes extinct every 250 years. But in the last 20 years, more than 100 species have died out and almost 36 per cent of the world's amphibians are threatened, he said.
"There's a worldwide amphibian decline. It's going to be the next mass extinction since the ice age."
If no action is taken, Scheffers said biodiversity will be compromised and the ecosystem severely threatened.
"Every time you remove one piece or one species, you might not notice it. You might remove a frog species or a flower species and not notice it. Eventually, that ecosystem starts swaying back and forth and finally, you remove that last piece that makes it tumble," he said.
"We're not at the point where life will cease to exist, but we're removing these pieces at an unprecedented rate."
Ultimately, Scheffers said he wants to submit a management plan to help the city maintain biodiversity when redeveloping land.
In particular, Scheffers said he hopes the city will start building smaller, more productive wetlands.
"We need to ensure that when we create new habitats, they are ecologically equivalent to the wetlands we have lost."
http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/story.html?id=e5a2b08d-31e0-4275-9ed6-49a353f18ab4

EDMONTON SUN (Alberta) 10 July 08 Sometimes it's hard to be amphibian (Ian McDougall)
Forget a canary in a coalmine, aspiring ecologist Brett Scheffers is relying on a salamander in a Tupperware container as his early warning system.
Scheffers, a biological sciences master's student, is studying man-made wetlands to determine whether they're as healthy for amphibians as the real thing.
These sloughs are becoming a common feature of new Edmonton developments, complete with reeds, bullrushes and small lakes.
What Scheffers wants to know is whether animals like frogs, snakes and salamanders are at home in the man-made version of their natural habitat.
What he's found out over the last year isn't encouraging.
"In Edmonton about 25% of our wetlands have been lost in the last six years," he said. "They have to construct wetlands to replace those that are lost. These wetlands are not as productive."
As Edmonton expands, sloughs, ponds and lakes get swallowed up by new developments.
But the amphibians Scheffers studies don't like the new man-made versions of their former homes.
In particular, the lack of heavy bush on top of compacted soil from the construction makes it impossible for some species to live there.
Tiger salamanders and garter snakes in particular are staying away from the residential lakes, Scheffers said.
Scheffers has a number of areas in the city he monitors to see what type of amphibians are showing up.
Scheffers patrols the areas regularly, along with his dog Guinness, to see what types of amphibians are in the area.
He will submit his findings to the city.
http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Edmonton/2008/07/10/6115821-sun.html