Endangered poison dart frog gets sanctuary in Colombia
— -- One of the deadliest frogs in the world just got a little breathing room.
A new 124-acre nature reserve in the South American nation of Colombia has been created to provide sanctuary to the endangered golden poison dart frog. The toxin on the frog's skin is so powerful that even coming into contact with a paper towel that has touched it can kill a small animal, experts say.
The new preserve is named Rana Terribilis Amphibian Reserve, Spanish for "terrible frog," from its Latin name Phyllobates terribilis. It is in the Chocó forest along the Pacific coast of western Colombia, which is the natural habitat of the frog. The reserve is owned and managed by Fundación ProAves, a conservation organization.
The reserve is in "one of the most impoverished regions in all of South America," says Nat Skinner, ProAves development director. The conservation group just hired a forest guardian from the nearby town of Timbiqui to protect the area. Prior to the creation of the reserve, the frog had no protection whatsoever.
The biggest threat to the golden poison frog is actually the search for gold. People engaged in illegal mining pour cyanide into streams because it binds with gold particles, making it easier to extract them. But the cyanide also kills everything in the waterway, Skinner says.
The frog is currently listed as endangered on The Red List of threatened species maintained by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
The bright orange/yellow skin of the 2-inch-long amphibian is covered by a secretion of deadly alkaloid poison known as a batrachotoxin. Once ingested it prevents nerves from transmitting impulses. The victim's muscles go into spasm, followed by heart failure and death.
The poison has to get into the bloodstream to be deadly, but even handling the frogs for "a minute or so" can cause numbness in the hands and arms, says Skinner. If the poison got in through an open wound you "could be dead within a few minutes."
The Chocó Emberá Indians brush their darts across the frogs' backs to poison them, with no harm done to the amphibians. The darts can remain deadly for more than two years.
Another danger to the frogs is collectors who want exotic animals. Biologist Jimmy Chapman points out that their allure is that they are so poisonous, but once in captivity they become harmless. He has cared for golden poison frogs at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, Calif., which is part of an international effort to protect the species by maintaining captive populations.
"The poison is based on what they eat. There's a specific beetle that lives in their habitat," he says.
The beetles contain toxins. When the frogs eat them, they are able to excrete the toxins on their backs, he says. When the frogs are fed a diet of crickets and fruit flies in captivity, they lose their toxicity.
The reserve was funded in part by the World Land Trust, American Bird Conservancy, and Global Wildlife Conservation. It is part of a larger project called the Chocó Corridor, which will connect multiple highly threatened habitats, from the Pacific Coast to the peaks of the western Andes.