Yellow-legged frog restoration slows, but positive signs show
By
Frank Santana, a research technician with the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research, prepares to make the first-ever release of endangered mountain yellow-legged frog tadpoles into a mountain stream. They are among 36 of the Southern California population of mountain yellow-legged frogs reintroduced into a stream near Idyllwild, Calif., Tuesday. There are believed to be less than 200 of the frogs living in the San Gabriel, San Bernardino and San Jacinto mountains. Photo: Courtesy
Frank Santana, a research technician with the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research, prepares to make the first-ever release of endangered mountain yellow-legged frog tadpoles into a mountain stream. They are among 36 of the Southern California population of mountain yellow-legged frogs reintroduced into a stream near Idyllwild, Calif., Tuesday. There are believed to be less than 200 of the frogs living in the San Gabriel, San Bernardino and San Jacinto mountains. Photo: CourtesyThe restoration of the Hill’s mountain yellow-legged frog population is continuing although no new releases of eggs are planned for 2012, according to Adam R. Backlin, ecologist at the U.S. Geological Survey’s Western Ecological Research Center in Irvine.
“It looks like our captive breeding program this year did not produce as many new frogs as we had hoped. So we will not be releasing any frogs in 2012,” Backlin wrote in an email last week. “Instead we will be head starting the 200 to 300 new frogs to an older life stage in captivity and releasing them in 2013 as juvenile frogs.”
The team continues to monitor frog releases from 2011 and did detect tadpoles in the creek as recently as February 2012, he added.
They are hoping some of tadpoles released in 2011 will have survived this winter and metamorphose into frogs this summer.
Two injury crashes occurred on Hill roads during the last week. The first, on Wednesday, Nov. 9, occurred on Highway 74 one mile west of Strawberry Creek Bridge. At 6:15 p.m. Alec Blume, 17, from San Jacinto, was driving his 2003 black Toyota Celica east on Highway 74 when he made an unsafe turning move…
Winter conditions were partly to blame for Hill crashes over the last week, including one serious incident involving a felony DUI. California Highway Patrol Public Information Officer Darren Meyer, the source of these reports, cautioned residents and visitors alike that winter conditions on the Hill can be dangerous and require extra measures of caution when…
Riverside County Superior Court disposed of a transient’s mental health diversion and probation suitability filings, and decided to move ahead with a jury trial for the man charged with starting the 2013 Silver Fire. Stephen Patrick Medlock, 56, was arrested and charged with starting the fire that burned more than 20,000 acres in Poppet Flats,…
Lisa Draper’s fourth grade students transport an “injured person” to the triage area during a Mountain Disaster Preparedness exercise held on Wednesday morning. The students from left to right are: Kate Taylor, Olivia Hernandez, David Cohen, Maggie McKimson, Emma Johnston, Destiny Mikroulis, Pierce Pramuka and Sidney Tschuor.
American Medical Response and Cal Fire/Riverside County Firefighters are on scene of a snake bite victim on Bonita Vista Road in Garner Valley, an incident reported at 2:38 p.m. Wednesday. The victim, an elderly female, will be transported via ground ambulance to an area hospital for treatment of what appeared to be a rattlesnake bite.
Several areas within Riverside County have been closed to public access because of high potential fire danger. At its May 25 meeting, the Riverside County Board of Supervisors approved County Fire Chief Bill Weiser’s recommendation to close six areas — North Mountain and Indian Canyon, Whitewater Canyon, Ramona Bowl (closed daily noon to sunrise), Bautista…
