Amphibians in the ecosystem

16 minutes ago
21 min read

By Mark H. Stowers

Michigan’s water and woods set the stage for an annual orchestral performance that begins when March weather warms and continues through late summer. The Michigan toads and frogs symphony features each species' mating song, from high-pitched trills and whistles to low-pitched moos. Common sounds include the high-pitched chorus of spring peepers, the long musical trill of the American toad, the banjo-pluck of Green Frogs, and the deep, loud bass of American Bullfrogs. These wetland and woodland creatures are key to Michigan's ecosystem, playing a vital role in the food chain and helping control insect populations. Michigan frogs and toads are also indicator species, offering insights into the health of water bodies—whether good or bad.

According to AmphibiaWeb March 2026 data, there are nearly 8,000 known species of frogs and toads worldwide. Michigan is home to 14 of these species. Experts across Michigan have studied, written papers and books about these creatures, and enjoyed the amphibian symphonies.

Frogs and toads found in Michigan include the Wood Frog, Northern Spring Peeper, Western Chorus Frog, Northern Leopard Frog, Eastern Gray Treefrog, Cope’s Gray Treefrog, Green Frog, American Bullfrog, Mink Frog, Pickerel Frog, Boreal Chorus Frog, Blanchard’s Cricket Frog, Eastern American Toad, and Fowler’s Toad.

Mark Vasallo, the Detroit Zoo Curator of Amphibians and the Director of the National Amphibian Conservation Center, offered a definition and described the benefits of frogs:

“The word amphibian means dual life. Most frogs have a larval stage which is fully aquatic. Then the tadpole stage, where they inhabit this aquatic ecosystem. They’re part of that system, meaning they’re being eaten and they’re eating things. They’re exchanging energy in this trophic cycle. They are a huge part of the aquatic ecosystem. They eat flies. They eat mosquito larvae as tadpoles. They eat algae. They control insect populations both as larvae and as adults, so that’s one advantage. But the big thing about amphibians is they inhabit those aquatic environments, and then they morph out. They grow their legs and get their lungs. They move on to land, and then they eat food and are eaten in that trophic cycle too. They play a big part in the energy transfer from aquatic to terrestrial environments on top of being an insect deterrent or an insect predator as well.”

The difference between frogs and toads? Retired Michigan State University Professor Jim Harding offered this explanation.

“The joke in my Herpetology class was ‘a toad is just a lumpy frog with short legs.’ The word toad used to be used real loosely, and in fact, some people called the tree frog a ‘tree toad.’ A toad has little round warts on the skin, which are mostly keratinized except for the parotid glands right behind the eyes. A toad is very short-legged, and it doesn’t leap; it kind of walks or makes short hops because it has short legs. And it’s mainly terrestrial. Of course, they have to breed in the water and they’re the ones that will take up residence in your garden underneath a shrub or something and just dig in there and just stay there.”

A frog is smooth-skinned and jumps using its long legs.

For 27 years, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) conducted an annual statewide frog survey where volunteers were organized to listen and document frog mating calls to estimate frog and toad populations. The survey ran from 1996 until 2023, when, after nearly three decades, the DNR canceled it due to staffing issues. The survey simply required too much time, energy and resources to coordinate. The DNR received federal funding until 2017. The survey involved volunteers visiting frog and toad habitats to listen, look and identify what they heard. Some organizations still conduct limited surveys, including the 2025 Rouge River Watershed Frog and Toad Survey, which covered 202 survey blocks, with data submitted for 154 of them. Eight species were heard, including (by highest average) American Toad, Green Frog, Gray Treefrog, Spring Peeper, Midland Chorus Frog, Wood Frog, Bullfrog, and Northern Leopard Frog. Experts in the study of frogs and toads explained their roles, what their food sources are, their reproduction cycles, predators, environmental challenges, which species are endangered, and more.

Frogs and toads both follow the same cycle of laying eggs, which hatch into tadpoles that eventually morph into frogs and toads. Each species lays a different number of eggs in various locations and patterns depending on their size. Smaller frog species lay fewer eggs than larger ones. Here is a closer look at each species.

Wood Frog

The first Michigan frog to make an appearance on stage each year and begin their mating calls is the Wood Frog. This endangered, small creature can be 1-1.5 inches but gives one of the most distinct and loudest mating calls. Found in vernal pond areas (a temporary, shallow wetland that fills with water in spring or fall from rain and snowmelt, drying out completely by late summer) where they mate and then go back to the woods, Wood Frogs sound much like ducks quacking. Oakland County Wildlife Program Coordinator Sean Zera described them as, “One of the fun ones. They are our one woodland frog, hence the name. They honestly look like they are carved out of wood. They are often different shades of brown.”

Wood Frogs live in moist woodlands in mixed forests and can be brown, grayish brown, bronze, reddish or tan background in color. They have a dark brown or blackish mask from the eye to the shoulder with a white stripe on their upper lip. Males can be nearly black.

Keith Berven, retired professor from Oakland University, spent 40 years studying Michigan’s Wood Frogs. His findings are being summarized in papers and a book. But frogs weren’t the first interest of this northwest US native. He thought he was going to work with birds, but when he came to the University of Maryland for his undergrad, he got interested in amphibians on a research trip to Ecuador. His four-decade study is a pond outside of Ann Arbor.

“The pond was completely surrounded by a fence with buckets buried in the ground that would allow me to catch all of the adults when they moved into the pond,” Berven explained. “I would count how many juveniles actually left the pond and I was able to follow survival and changes over all those years.”

Wood Frogs are the first to breed in Michigan and have a special capability.

“These frogs can tolerate freezing,” he explained. “They get through the winter months sort of buried slightly below the surface of the ground under leaf litter. They tolerate ice in their body and are pretty much frozen throughout the winter. In spring, when temperatures warm, they literally thaw out and emerge from hibernation and move to ponds to reproduce. They tend to breed in small woodland ponds, vernal ponds.”

He noted the male Wood Frogs have “a little black eye patch like a raccoon. They blend in well with the leaves. They have a short breeding period of a week or so.”

For those looking to find a Wood Frog, he notes, “They are more active in the evening or when it’s raining or wet.”

The Wood Frog is mostly threatened by habitat destruction, according to professor Berven.

“What people see as a weedy, wet area usually are viable habitats for reproduction for many amphibians. By filling in wetlands and those habitats, you are basically getting rid of areas where they would reproduce. There has also been a lot of work looking at the effect of road salt as that runoff tends to accumulate in bodies of water and negatively affects amphibians.”

Climate change has a continuing effect on amphibians and Berven explained that “Wood Frogs spend the winter in a frozen state and if temperatures fluctuate, they’re basically thawing and refreezing and they expend a lot of energy and that could affect their survival.”

Another climate change effect is that if a vernal pond that usually dries up, doesn’t.

“Green Frogs will successfully come in, and breed in August or September, and their tadpoles have to overwinter to complete their development the following year, and when Wood Frogs come into lay their eggs, the Green Frog tadpoles consume them,” Berven explained.

Wood Frog egg predators include Dragonfly larvae as the main one, as well as Diving Beetle larvae and salamander larvae. Harding noted the early March warm days get Wood Frogs in action.

“They’re like the first little plants to bloom. They’re pretty hardy. They come up and get snowed on, and then they’re okay,” the Detroit Zoo’s Vasallo said. “And I think the little frogs, the vernal pond species, are all pretty tough. They call when it’s warm, and then when it gets cold, they sink to the bottom and go back into their dormant state. Then wait out a few days until it warms up again.”

For those looking to listen for Wood Frogs or any frogs in particular, he offered some advice.

“If you go out about 8 p.m. on a warm spring day and don’t make a big fuss and don’t splash around a lot, you can go out where they are calling and just stand still, and they’ll start calling again,” Professor Harding said. “A trick my photographer friends taught me is to put a flashlight on them, and they get mesmerized for a minute or two.”

Northern Spring Peeper

Another small frog ranging from .8-1.5-inches, the Northern Spring Peeper is active in March along with the Wood Frog. They can be found in temporary and permanent ponds, marshes, flooded areas as well as ditches during their breeding season. Then they move back into woodlands and fields. These brown, tan or gray background frogs have an X shape mark on their backs and a V shape mark between their eyes. A dark stripe from nostril to the eye and sometimes down the side of their body. With a pale yellow, white or cream belly, their legs are dark bars on top and are yellow or pinkish on the bottom. They have a high pitch peep mating call and may also have a low-pitched whistle which is used as a territorial marking response.

Their diet consists of any insect small enough to fit into their mouth such as ants, beetles, flies, caterpillars, and spiders. They are also a food source for many other animals such as fish, birds, snakes, and larger frogs.

Berven noted the Northern Spring Peeper breeds at the same time of the Wood Frog but for several more weeks. Thomas M. Goniea, a Sci Coll Permit Program Specialist and DNR Fisheries Division Biologist, described the small amphibian’s mating call.

“The peepers are really, really high-pitched and loud. It’s interesting because they are so loud, but they’re incredibly small. They can sit on your thumbnail. Incredibly small frog even as a full-grown adult. What’s really interesting is seeing them calling. Their throat pouch will actually inflate almost the entire size of their body and then deflate pushing that air out and making that noise that they make. They’re very, very common, but most people don’t see them.”

Western Chorus Frog

Another small frog, anywhere from 0.7 – 1.5 inches, the Western Chorus Frog is a brown, reddish or even tan to gray and sometimes olive background color with a white or cream strip along their upper lip and a dark brown stripe that runs from the nose through the eye to the groin. They can be found in marshes, meadows, swales, wet woods or wooded swampy areas and are often found taking refuge under logs, rocks and leaf litter. Their mating call is a short scratchy creek that goes up in pitch much like the sound you hear when running your fingernail across a pocket comb.

Harding notes the Chorus Frogs are usually the third frog species to start calling but their numbers have diminished.

“The chorus frogs seem to be declining pretty precipitously over the last couple of decades. If I hear them at all, it will be one or two where it used to choruses of hundreds of them,” he said. “They breed in very shallow, very ephemeral waters which depend on rainfall to maintain the water in what are basically puddles. I was at Dansville State Game area many years ago and a farmer there had driven his tractor through leaving big tractor ruts which had filled with water and believe me, the Chorus Frogs were just going nuts in those ruts. We’ve had some pretty severe drought years, and that knocks them right back because those puddles they breed in dry out and don’t refill. They can lose whole breeding seasons.”

Northern Leopard Frog

This once-abundant frog suffered declines in the 1980s when the chemical DDT was widely used. Usually 2-4.4 inches, they are currently uncommon or rare in Michigan. When found they enjoy marshes, bogs, lake and stream edges as well as fields, meadows and suburban lawns. With dark round spots, these frogs are green, greenish brown and brown to copper. With a dark spot over each eye and nose, they have a white line running from their nose to shoulder and their upper lip often has a white stripe bordered by a black blotchy line along with a while belly and very pale green or yellow tinted groin.

Harding explained the call of the Northern Leopard Frog.

“In early April, if you get some warmer days, you get the Northern Leopard Frog. It has a snore-like, very low-pitched call, which some people have a hard time even hearing because it’s such a subtle call. But it’s a very low kind of snort and snorkel-type call.” He also explained the Northern Leopard Frog has had a rough time in Michigan.

“Northern Leopard frogs will live in most permanent water situations, farm ponds and such. We still have a few leopard frogs around here. At one time, when I was a kid, and that was a long time ago, the Northern Leopard Frog was probably the most common frog in the state. I mean everywhere. They used to call them the Meadow Frog because after the breeding season was over, they’d wander off into the fields and woodland, edges and whatnot. You’d see them hopping all over the place. But they declined drastically during the DDT years when they were using lots of chlorinated hydrocarbon pesticides. Leopard Frogs were unusually sensitive to those and they declined very, very rapidly. And for many years, there were almost no leopard frogs at all.”

Vasallo noted that “Leopard Frogs have a pretty robust population on Belle Isle.”

Eastern Gray Treefrog

This frog ranges in size from 1.2-2.4 inches and is found in deciduous or mixed forests, farm woodlots, swamps, old fields, well-vegetated yards and suburban areas, and can inhabit areas with suitable breeding ponds near trees or shrubs. These frogs can change color but are mostly gray but can be brown or pale brown with dark blotches on the back and dark stripe from the eye to the front leg. With a white belly their inner thighs are often bright yellow or orange. Their skin is warty and moist. The Eastern Gray Treefrog has a loud, musical trill lasting up to three seconds.

Harding offered more detail:

“About the same time the Northern Leopard Frogs are finishing up, the Eastern Gray Treefrogs begin to call. You get some nice rains in in mid to late April, and some warm weather and you get the Tree frogs calling. We still have some really good populations of gray tree frogs in this area. They seem to be fairly tolerant of whatever is being done to the land.”

Treefrogs are often found on the sides of houses, as “We can watch them hopping around on windows catching the insects that are attracted to the light inside,” he added.

Cope’s Gray Treefrog

Nearly identical to the Eastern Gray Treefrog but far less in number, the mating call of the Cope’s gray Treefrog is faster, harsher and a more nasal trill sound.

“The Cope’s gray Treefrog is found in Michigan. It’s not as common as the Eastern Gray Tree Frog, but it has a different call and the call is faster and harsher,” Harding stated. “Cope’s Gray Treefrog are common in small areas like a marsh.”

Their toe pads are very large, and they have granular skin. Their coloring varies from gray to light green, and they have orange inner thighs. They also sport a whitish spot right below their eyes. This frog has an amazing chameleon-like camouflage defense mechanism. It can slowly blend with its environment. The Grey Tree frog can be seen all over Michigan in wooded habitats like backyards, forests and swamps. Various types of moths and insects are all part of its diet. Snails are rare prey for these frogs and other types of similarly-sized frogs across Michigan.

Green Frog

As one of the most abundant frogs across the Great Lakes region, the Green Frogs are a bit larger running anywhere from 2.4-4.2 inches and can be found in ponds, lakes, swamps, sloughs, impoundments and slow-moving streams. The may be green, yellowish green, olive, brown or any combination. With a green or yellow upper lip, they often have dark spotting on back and sides with a white belly and dark bars on their hind legs. A Blue Green Frog is not uncommon. Their mating call can be one or series of descending metallic notes like a banjo being plucked. They can also let out a low growl to ward off any other Green Frog from entering their territory.

Green Frogs maintain small home ranges around water sources and spend about a third of their time foraging for resources (especially in regions of abundant leaf litter and dense vegetation), returning to the water for refuge. Their habitat has also been impacted by human interaction from the development of roads, buildings and other infrastructure and agriculture which involves the destruction of their habitat. However, if there is abundant and quality habitat nearby, green frogs have the capability to flee from deforestation and are also somewhat tolerant of that destruction. Green frogs tend to move primarily among three distinct types of aquatic habitats: ephemeral wetland, stream, and swamp. Additionally, green frogs look for soil moisture, fine woody debris, and fewer trees with water cover as they tend to inhabit areas near water and with open environments in order to survive.

“The Green Frog is like an American Bullfrog but has a different call. It is smaller,” Vasallo said. “The males when they call sound like a person snoring. It’s just really interesting.”

American Bullfrog

With mating calls lasting deep into summer, the American Bullfrog is the only species that is permitted to be hunted in the state of Michigan with a limit of 10 from May to mid-November and those 17 and older must have a fishing license. Ranging in size from 3.7-8 inches, these are the largest frog species in North America. American Bullfrogs can be found in just about any still, permanent body of water with a preference for those with plenty of submerged and emergent aquatic vegetation. They can be all green, yellow green, olive and sometimes brown with spotting or blotches on their backs and dark bars on upper legs with a white or cream belly.

“Obviously, your biggest frog in the state is the bullfrog,” Goniea said. “It’s really the only one that has any kind of recreational following as far as people going and catching them for food. I would describe their populations as stable but middle of the range. They’re certainly not super common, and part of that’s because they call and give away their position every night. So, if somebody does want to harvest bullfrogs, their call is a ‘come and get me’ kind of thing for people to home in on their positions.”

Mink Frog

Cool, permanent bodies of water with lots of emergent and floating plants are the main habitat for Mink Frogs. They range in size from 1.8-3 inches and can live in slow streams, boggy lake inlets and spring fed ponds with a penchant for lily pads. Their backs and sides may be green, olive, or brown, with heavy dark spots or blotches. The top of the hind legs have rounded spots or vertical stripes and their underside can be completely yellow. Careful if you pick one up, their skin produces a musky odor like rotting onions.

Many frog hunters will have to head north to find this Michigan native that resembles another Michigan frog.

“The Mink Frog is specific to the UP (Upper Peninsula),” Goniea said. “It looks very, very close to a green frog. When I get pictures from the UP of mink frogs or green frogs, I usually have to get a second opinion on my ID because they are that close.”

Harding added more information:

“They’re a northern adapted frog. They’re a late breeder. Superficially, they look very much like a Green Frog and they even breed in some of the same areas that green frogs breed in. They look like a small bullfrog and they like deep water, and like areas with a lot of lily pads. So, they’ll sit out on a lily pad in three or four feet of water. And if they’re frightened, go all the way to the bottom and sit there. They’re pretty shy little things. They have a little chuckle like call that I’ve heard quite a few times in the Upper Peninsula there, and they they’ll call it right into July. They are a late breeder and their call is interesting. It sounds like roofers hammering shingles on our roof.”

He noted the call was so real his father thought a house was actually being built on the lake. Vasallo pointed out another interesting feature of the Mink Frog.

“It releases this interesting toxin, this smelly toxin. That’s why it’s call it a Mink Frog, because it smells like the toxin of a mink or the mink musk,” he said.

Pickerel Frog

This species can be uncommon and rare across the state and small in stature from 1.7-3.4 inches and the most likely habitat would be a bog, fen, pond, stream, springs, sloughs and lake coves. They prefer clear water but often inhabit grassy stream banks and where streams flow into the above-mentioned habitats. Pickerel Frogs have square brown back spots in two irregular rows on a light brown, tan, gray or olive background. Their spots are usually outlined in black and their groin and hind legs undersides can be yellow, orange or gold while their throat and belly are usually white. Their mating call is a low pitched, croak that sounds like a snore. They are more common in the northern part of the state and are only rarely found in southern Michigan.

The Pickerel Frog secrete a skin toxin that can cause irritation to human eyes and mucous membranes, which also acts as a defense mechanism against predators.

Boreal Chorus Frog

There have been recent declines with the Boreal Chorus Frog in suburban and agricultural areas. They range in size from .7-1.5 inches and prefer open habitats like marshes, meadows and swales and can be found in wet woods or swampy areas with lots of trees and like to make homes under logs, rocks and leaf litter. These endangered frogs are brown, reddish, tan to gray or olive background with white or cream stripe along their upper lip. They also have a brown stripe from their nose to the groin with three greenish-black stripes on their back that often break into spots. Their belly can be cream or white with dark speckling on the chest and throat. With a scratchy creek that rises in pitch like the Western Chorus Frog’s fingernail on a pocket comb, the frogs skin is moist and slightly rough.

“They are in the extreme western UP bordering Minnesota and Wisconsin. And on Isle Royal,” Harding said.

Blanchard’s Cricket Frog

A rare and declining specie, The Blanchard’s Cricket Frog is small, ranging in size from .6-1.5 inches and lives on the edges of ponds, bogs, lakes, sluggish rivers or streams and is known to be found in mud flats and sandy shorelines as well. With a brown, tan, olive or gray back, the Blanchard Cricket Frog has patterns consisting of green, reddish or black with broad, light stripe down the center of the back with two light bars from the jaw to the eyes where you can usually see a triangle between the eyes. Many times, they have a dark stripe from the shoulder to the groin with another inside each thigh. There can also be a dark band of pigment on the upper leg. Their skin is warty and their mating call sounds like pebbles being tapped together sounding like clicks that can last more than half a minute with a slow to increasing tempo.

The Blanchard Cricket Frog is a late breeder for a small frog, mating in May and early June and according to Harding, “You’re not going to find them in big lakes but in deeper marshes and marshy lakes with a lot of thick vegetation. They’re called Cricket Frogs because they have this little click sound, ‘tick, tick, tick, tick.’ It’s an unusual little frog.”

The name comes from a University of Michigan professor, Frank Blanchard, who was a herpetologist for the university and discovered the frog.

“The Blanchard Cricket Frog is a very rare frog. In fact, it’s considered a threatened species in Michigan. Very little populations of cricket frogs anymore,” Harding said. “Found, mostly in the western side of the state. But they’re not at all common anywhere. They have really long leaps, twenty times the length of their bodies. They’re pretty amazing, but they, for some reason they’re not doing well in this state. I suspect it has to do with their not being good at overwintering. They tend to overwinter in little spring creeks that seep through the soil. They get into these little seepage areas around the edge. If they can find the edge of a lake with a little spring coming in there, and that’s where they try to overwinter.”

Eastern American Toad

The most common of the toads in Michigan, the Eastern American Toad can be 2-4.4 inches and enjoy living in open woodland areas, forest edges, prairies, meadows, marshes as well as suburban areas and agricultural land. They have dark rounded spots on the back and their colors range from tan, brown, red-brown to gray or olive and their throat and underside are pale with black or gray spots. Their mating call is a high pitched trill than can last more than 30 seconds. Berven explained the Eastern American Toad starts mating when temperatures get near 80 degrees.

“They will come out and move to the ponds,” he said.

Fowler’s Toad

The Fowler’s Toad is hard to find toads. They are anywhere from 2 – 3.7 inches and live in open woodlands, sandy prairies, meadows and beaches as well as farm and city landscapes. They like sandy soils found on shorelines and rivers. The Fowler Toad’s colors can be tan or brown or olive green or gray with a lighter central back stripe. Their backs have several dark spots or blotches with underside that is light in color with dark spots on the chest as well. They have a very warty skin and have a low-pitched, nasal bleat as a mating call that last anywhere from two to seven seconds.

“If you live along Lake Michigan, you’re more likely to see Fowler’s Toads or hear Fowler’s Toads. They’re very hard to tell from an American Toad but their calls are totally different. An American Toad has this long trill, very, very long, sometimes even a minute long. Whereas a Fowler’s toad just goes and they’re so completely different,” Goniea said.

Frogs can be a precursor to environmental problems according to Goniea.

“Frogs are definitely an indicator species. When something goes bad in the environment, amphibians such as frogs and salamanders are going to be the first things that start dying. Their skin is very semipermeable, making them susceptible to any type of environmental change that affects pH, or that affects the environment. If there is some sort of environmental contamination, the first things that go are the frogs,” according to Goniea.

He also explained that the frog population in general is in decline, saying “The U.S. Geological Survey did a study about 10 years ago that basically showed frogs in general were in decline. And it didn’t matter whether it was a common species or a rare species, they were in decline. And not a Michigan thing, not a U. S .thing, this appears to be worldwide phenomenon.”

Not wanting to discourage young children’s curiosity, Goniea noted one way to help keep the frog population safe is to wash your hands before handling them.

“If you have some sort of hand sanitizer or perfume, frogs are sensitive to picking up and absorbing those things,” he said.

Michigan does not any poisonous frogs but some species can emit a distasteful secretion that helps them survive predators.

“If a dog picks up a toad, they can have a bad reaction to the toad,” Goniea said.

Frog and toad predators are mainly large birds, such as herons, storks and crains.

“Obviously, your wading birds – blue herons, storks – those birds that are walking in the shoreline area of your lakes or your ponds, or any places that have lily pads. Main predators in the water are fish and snakes.”

Vasallo added, “Frogs and toads are preyed on by other amphibians. So larger amphibians, sometimes of the same species, can eat them.

In order to help frog and toad species prosper, waterfront landowners can play a big part. Goniea notes that a pristine, clean beachfront isn’t a frog’s best friend.

“There is nothing worse that you can do for a lake than to have a ‘golf course’ lawn that goes right down to the water’s edge. Lake shorelines are meant to have cattails, lily pads and if a tree falls in it, it’s meant to be. It provides places for frogs, turtles and juvenile fish to hide. You don’t have a completely untamed shoreline. If you’ve got 100 feet of shoreline, leave 50 feet in a more naturalized state and manicure the other 50. Find photos of natural shoreline on a wild lake and try to mimic that on your own property.”

Michigan State University Extension Natural Resources Office offers advice of, “Use a diverse mix of native plant species that can provide ample food and protection. You can also maintain natural wetlands or add water features. Minimizing the use of chemicals, such as applying fertilizers and pesticides on non-windy and dry days, mowing from the inside out, and controlling rainwater runoff are all simple ways to help protect frogs.”

A knowledge of native and invasive plants is key as invasive plants do not provide a normal habitat for amphibians. At the Detroit Zoo, Vasallo explained the conservation center was created to help preserve and benefit amphibians around the world.

“That’s a big reason that this building even exists, the National Amphibian Conservation Center. In the early 80s, it was pretty obvious that amphibian populations worldwide were declining. There is a statistic out there that says, roughly 40 to 50 percent of all amphibian species are either endangered, threatened or at risk of extinction. A lot of the folks that I work with in Central America, South America are witnessing kind of the same phenomenon. This is significant because they are our indicator species. What we’re experiencing is maybe an indication that a lot of our ecosystems are degrading because of this loss of amphibians. There’s several reasons for that. There’s an infectious disease, a pathogenic fungus known as ‘chytrid fungus. And that has really had a very ill effect on survivorship and amphibians worldwide. And that’s a fungus that has become even more prevalent in the last 20-40 years because of the change in the environment, the change in the climate. And also, because of the global nature of our world, where people are transferring pathogens all over the planet. This particular fungus evolved in Asia and eventually was brought to Central America and that started decimating amphibian populations in Central America, as well as South America. This building was created in the early 2000s in order to become a leading facility in breeding and reintroducing amphibians because of this decline. A big part of our mission now is to conserve amphibians.”

The 14 species of Michigan frogs and toads sing their mating songs from spring to summer and their harmonies are the backdrop to a peaceful summer night. Living in harmony and keeping the population thriving is key for nature’s amphibious music to continue.

Photo Credits:

Western Chorus Frog Jason P Ross | Dreamstime.com