Do you like frogs?

Well WE do … and tomorrow night, Monday the 16th February 2009, Pieter and the WildEarth crew are going to do something for the very first time … WE are going to take you frogging!
Thats right you are going to come along with us as WE go in search of as many different species of frog as possible in the waterholes and puddles of Djuma. Now the reason that WE are doing this is not only to gross you out by watching Pieter flop around in an African waterhole at night and try and catch frogs with his bare hands (although that would be worth it), but it has a very important purpose. You see frogs are a very important indicator species, they tell us a lot about the health of an ecosystem, the more of them there are, and very importantly the more different ones that there are, the more robust and vibrant the system is. Frogs breath through their skins (to some extent) and this means that if there are any unhealthy pollutants in the water frogs are the first to react … and disappear!
Now WE are pretty confident that things are good in the ecosystem, and WE certainly hear a lot of frogs, I am sure that you would agree with that! What WE want to find out is just how many different frogs WE can find in an hour or so of searching. And you are going to play a critical role … because WE do not know every frog out there and you have access to the Internet. So what WE are asking is that you find a couple of frog websites, with pictures, (maybe share them on the social network) and get ready for tomorrow night at about 18h00 CAT (Central African Time). Pieter will catch a frog and show it to the camera, Rory will snap a high res image of the frog, and then you need to see if you can identify the frog and mail in the ID to AS the IDs come through the director will radio Pieter and the crew at the waterholes who will then tell you what frog it is. The next day I will Blog all the pics, with IDs and a little info on each frog. This set of data will then allow us to compare next year, and in future years how the Djuma ecosystem is doing … by counting frogs and IDing them!
So get ready for LIVE frogging at Djuma on WildEarth … its in your nature.