A love match made in Montserrat (with a little help from Durrell)

Monday 15 August 2016

These are two frogs who will be hoping their loved one doesn’t croak it. That’s because there are only two them left in the Caribbean island of Montserrat.

In February, a fundraising appeal was triggered in a last-ditch attempt to unite the only remaining wild mountain chickens on the island. They are one of the largest and most endangered amphibian species in the world and are only found in Montserrat and its neighbouring island Dominica.

The appeal successfully raised £5,000, enabling Jersey-based Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust to tell the latest chapter in a fairytale-like story bringing a mountain chicken and her ‘Prince’ together. 

Following an overwhelming response from Durrell supporters the funds were raised, allowing the project to go ahead.

Living just 700 metres apart in a rain forested site of Montserrat appropriately known as Fairy Walk, field workers moved the last female into the territory of the sole remaining male. 

They will now be monitored and it is hoped the re-united pair will breed, spawning precious offspring that will bring hope for their survival in Montserrat.

Explaining what the project might mean for the indigenous frog population on Montserrat, Durrell Amphibian Programme Manager Jeff Dawson said: “These two frogs now have a chance of breeding, whereas if we’d left them where they were the poor male would just be sat there calling every night with no one to hear him.”

Mountain chicken numbers have been decimated by as much as 99% in recent years - believed to be one of the fastest death rates of any species ever recorded -  predominantly due to a devastatingly lethal fungal disease called chytridiomycosis. 

Despite this, these two resilient frogs on Montserrat have survived, raising hopes that they possess a resistance that could be passed on to surviving offspring in future.

Mr Dawson said: “If they do breed that would be brilliant and a fantastic, good news ray of light for the recovery programme.”

Durrell is committed to ensuring the survival of amphibian species including the wild mountain chicken, which until recently was a local delicacy. 

Author Michael Hudson said: “These findings from Dominica and Montserrat provide perhaps the starkest evidence to date of the terrifying rate at which chytrid is destroying the genetic diversity of amphibian populations worldwide and driving many species towards extinction.”