Amphibian Post Mortems with Garden Wildlife Health

This weekend I headed to the Institute of Zoology in Regents Park London zoo for the second time this month! Last week I headed to the Amphibian Research Conservation Symposium which was full of really interesting talks about global research being conducted to better understand and combat amphibian declines. Talks covered topics far and wide including habitat loss and fragmentation, the impacts of roads on dispersal, disease impacts and possible solutions including treatment in the wild to updates on pool frog reintroductions in the UK.

This week I headed there laden with bags full of deceased frogs, toads and ice packs in a bid to learn why they had died. I was joining the Garden Wildlife Health Project veterinary surgeons (http://www.gardenwildlifehealth.org/) to observe post-mortems in action to try and determine their causes of deaths. Samples of organs were stored for histology as well as liver samples for ranavirus detection and skin samples for Bd detection. Swabs were also taken for Bd as well as Bs detection. Bs (Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans) is a new species of chytrid fungus that has been recently found to be causing deaths in fire salamanders in the Netherlands (Martel et al 2013).

The lungs and intestine of all mortalities were inspected for parasites, with a variety being found – one especially interesting case were two toads from the same site whose intestines were jam packed full of nematodes. Nematodes are multicellular organisms that look quite worm like and can cause various diseases. Many of these parasites will live alongside their host without causing disease or death. One cause of death that is common at this time of year is drowning. This could be detected by dark filamentous lungs instead of clear ones. Drowning is common in the mating season where amplexus can get quite aggressive.

The Garden Wildlife Health team are doing brilliant work monitoring disease across birds, mammals, amphibians as well as collating important information to try and enable a better understanding of what may be driving these diseases. They are currently trying to encourage anyone that finds dead hedgehogs to get in touch to better understand diseases affecting them across the UK. Any reports of unhealthy or dead wildlife found in your garden can be really helpful to the future of UK conservation efforts!

Since my trip to London (I also saw David Attenborough filming in London which was rather exciting!) I have been continuing with lab analysis of swabs from ponds across Cornwall and have found some interesting results from analysis of the frog mortality database. My first PCR plate was ran yesterday (a reaction used to amplify DNA before testing it against a known disease positive to see whether the sample is positive or negative for the disease), so I am eagerly anticipating the results of this before continuing with the rest of my samples.