California's declining frogs

Unless you've been hiding under a rock, you'll know that 2008 is Year of the Frog (more here), and that several projects - including Amphibian Ark and EDGE - are working to try and save endangered frog and toad species before they become extinct. We need to do all we can to continue to drum up interest in the conservation effort that many of us are now involved in. Quest, a science show at KQED (the PBS station in San Francisco), has just produced a new video concentrating on the decline of Californian Yellow-legged frogs R. boylii (aka Foothill yellow-legged frog, and it's - apparently - not R. boylei as often stated) and Red-legged frogs R. aurora draytonii: you can watch it here (with extras), or right here, right now...

PS - remember to sign the online Amphibian Ark petition!

PPS - am obviously back from the conference. More on that soon. Giant pterosaurs, Gerhard Heilmann's angels, the 1916 sinking of the SS Mount Temple, Dynamosaurus, Gideon Mantell's baryonychines, Piltdown man and Arthur Conan Doyle's dinosaurs, and much more. Where else could you hear the line ".. from the north came the furry tyrannosaurs"?

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I have a lot on at the moment, so getting this finished wasn't easy - but I managed it. Here we are with the rest of my recollections from 'Dinosaurs (and other extinct saurians) - A Historical Perspective', held at Burlington House (home of the Geological Society of London) on May 6th and 7th (…
I have not forgotten that 2008 is Year of the Frog: if you have, or if you didn't know this, please go back to December 2007 and read the explanatory article here. Some of you will also recall the EDGE project (EDGE = Evolutionary Distinct and Globally Endangered), and here we look at an anuran…
So, was it really 'the best conference of all time'? Hmm, maybe, but it was excellent and all went well (more or less). On May 6th and 7th I attended 'Dinosaurs (and other extinct saurians) - A Historical Perspective', a meeting featuring a packed schedule of talks and posters devoted to Mesozoic…
It's hardly a secret that I've had a bit of a thing going for frogs and toads - anurans - during the latter part of 2007 (the anuran series has so far consisted of part I, part II, part III, part IV, part V, part VI, and part VII). While the whole exercise was a good excuse to learn a lot about…