Atelopus Zeteki
“Atelopus Zeteki? Not a Greek Yogurt brand, but a crucial frog for our rainforests.”
BY: DANIELA MALLARINO
Artwork by Matsumoto Hoji
In 2006, The Hotel Campestre El Valle in Panama allocated 28 out of their 29 rooms to one guest in particular: the Panamanian Golden Frog.
It wasn’t for luxury nights or an enjoyable vacation stay. It was for survival.
Atelopus Zeteki? Not a Greek Yogurt brand, but a crucial frog for our rainforests.
Under ideal circumstances, this article would tell you that the Panamanian Golden Frog, an emblematic symbol of Panama, lives on the eastern side of the Tabasara mountain range in the Coclé and Panama provinces.
Photo of a Panamanian Golden Frog. Source
But the Panamanian Golden Frog began vanishing from the mountains in the 1990s, and since 2007 it has been extinct in the wild. Frogs kept appearing dead in the rainforests, and scientists were puzzled over the malign forces affecting the population numbers and the species survival. After months, it was discovered that the frogs were suffering from a fungal infection. Namely:
Chytridiomycosis
Chytridiomycosis, an infectious disease affecting mostly amphibians, had successfully penetrated the Panamanian Golden Frog population in Panama. Conservation efforts still continue today, but re-introducing the frogs in the wild takes major effort, time, money…and a whole new ecosystem free of diseases, pollution, and human development.
Several frogs were shipped to the U.S. with the belief that they could better thrive abroad. In addition to exporting the endangered frogs, the Houston Zoo also helped fund a local centre (EVACC) in Panama with the aim of observing and monitoring the species more closely. The centre was established in 2004; two years later, it was already at full capacity.
And here’s where our Homo Sapiens hotel enters the picture: it adapted its 28 rooms with terrariums to accommodate the frogs, each with daily cleansings, 24-hour room service, and a dinner of gourmet specialty crickets; they were responsible for housing over 300 frogs.
In Panama, the frog image has been used in lottery tickets and local mythology, and the poison of the frog has been used for centuries by the Indigenous people of the Panamanian forests for arrow poison.
While the Panamanian Golden Frog is the most revered by locals, it is certainly not the only one at risk; more than 40% of amphibian species worldwide are at imminent risk of extinction.
Frogs have existed for over 300 million years, but since the 1950s, their populations have declined dramatically, as they are threatened by disease, pollution, invasive species, and climate change. It is believed that more than 120 species have already become extinct since the 1980s.
As working mammals in urban centres, we may not notice the loss of amphibians where they belong, but their part in maintaining a healthy ecosystem is more valuable than we think.
Let me tell you why you should care about your amphibian roommates:
Amphibians are responsible for reducing the chances of algal contamination, help regulate insect populations by eating them, and also serve as food for many animals such as birds, fish, monkeys, and snakes.
The disappearance of frogs can disturb an intricate food web with overflowing effects throughout an entire ecosystem.
We need to protect them, and we also need to stop killing them.
The proliferation of Chytridiomycosis (remember that fungal disease?) was enabled by humans through global trade, and today, the diseases’ survival and strength may be in part due to, ahem, yes, climate change…
Here’s one hypothesis. The rise in temperatures have increased evaporation in certain forest environments. As a result, it has promoted cloud formation. We all know the feeling of relief when a cloud appears in the middle of a sunny day to give us shade; or, in other words, to decrease the temperature. But what do clouds do at night?
Instead of decreasing the temperature, the cloud cover serves as insulation to raise the ‘normal’ nighttime temperature. This combination of decreased daylight temperatures and increased nighttime temperatures may be providing an environment of optimal growth for the Chytridiomycosis because it doesn’t let it die.
Changes in temperatures modify the functionality of entire ecosystems, giving advantages to organisms that would otherwise complete their regular life cycle on their own.
During Covid-19, many have said that Earth has been getting a break from human pollution. While much of that is true, if we don’t change the way we relate to non-human organisms, we won’t even be able to protect ourselves.
The trajectory of the Panamanian Golden Frog makes me extremely sad, and I feel even more disheartened when I realize how many more species are already extinct, or on their way to being wiped out.
When I came across the extinction of the Panamanian Golden Frog while reading Elizabeth Kolbert’s book, The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History, I was shocked to realize that the book, along with the alarming challenges it raised, was published in 2014 and the critical situation of the frogs was already happening in the 1990s.
We are in 2020, and the extinction of the Panamanian Golden Frog is still a pressing concern.
Not only do we need to care because of the lack of biodiversity, sounds, and life that we’re losing; but because we are part of the consequences too. We are already seeing the detrimental effects of climate change with temperature rises, wildfires, droughts, and excessive rains. In a few years, the danger will seem even more threatening.
While much of the ruling systems can’t be immediately reformed by single individual efforts, if we can change the way we see ‘our world’ and start paying more attention to all the life surrounding us, we may start understanding that there is more to our own human routines. There is life all around us, and it deserves to be heard.
Offering hotel rooms to help preserve the Atelopus Zeteki is one step closer to involving more people in the process of supporting non-human species. But the battle doesn’t end there.
We need to think beyond the Panamanian Golden Frog and start observing the life around us. Once we’re able to understand and appreciate their systems, the quest of protecting that life will suddenly feel imperative and crucial.
In this hotel of life, we’re all temporary guests. Let’s make sure we don’t kill these beautiful species before we check out and return our room keys.
