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At your next visit to Seneca Park Zoo, prepare to be captivated by the freckled, stunning, golden shine of the Panamanian golden frogs, also known as Atelopus zeteki. As mesmerizing as these frogs are, it’s best to keep your hands to yourself.
The beautiful, yet deceiving, pattern of a Panamanian golden frog is bright in color to serve as a rather abrupt warning for other animals to stay away. Their skin is quite poisonous. It secretes a water-soluble neurotoxin that can be strong enough to kill 130 to 1,000 mice. For this very reason, Seneca Park Zoo experts wear gloves to handle these little amphibians with care.
Assistant Curator John Adamski from the Seneca Park Zoo talked to (585) Kids about why the Panamanian golden frog has evolved to have poisonous skin.
“They have all these threats, but they’re so safe because they’re toxic by nature,” says Adamski. “Nothing eats them or their eggs, provided they can live in a stream and develop, so nothing can eat them. They have actually evolved to have this. It’s an animal that’s been around for millions of years, and it’s pretty tough. But now, without a doubt, these are the most endangered animals in the entire zoo.”
While the Seneca Park Zoo is the perfect place to admire their various animals; it’s also a sanctuary for some of them that wouldn’t otherwise survive in the wild. This zoo aims to spread awareness and educate the public, especially when it Visit the Panamanian golden frog at the Seneca Park Zoo! SPONSORED STORY is one of the only places keeping the golden frogs from total extinction.
“They were under a number of threats,” says Adamski. “That’s what usually happens when you start to see populations dwindle. There’s never one thing that gets them; there’s like several things happening at once. For the golden frog it was habitat loss, global warming, and increase in collection. Also, some of the streams these guys were from are somewhat polluted nowadays, and then the final punch was the chytrid fungus.”
The last natural sighting of Panamanian golden frogs was almost fourteen years ago, in 2009. This is due to the rapid spread of the chytrid fungus, which spreads via water. This fungus is hurtful to the golden frogs, damaging their skin and preventing them from absorbing important electrolytes into their body, causing eventual heart attack.
“The chytrid fungus is an amphibian fungus that causes a disease called chytridomycosis, which is 100% fatal to golden frogs,” says Adamski. “It’s a fungal spore that thrives in really humid environments, sometimes tropical environments. This spore gets on their skin, which is very sensitive since there’s a lot of respiration between their skin. When they get that fungus and it grows on them, it actually coats their skin and disrupts that keratin layer.”
Seneca Park Zoo staff has worked hard to create a beautiful home away from home for these critically endangered amphibians. This exhibit features lush green vegetation, a gently flowing stream into a small body of water, and little rocky hideaways that mimic the Panamanian rainforest, where the golden frogs used to live. This glass-encased environment was created as the ideal setting to save these frogs from total extinction and thrive.
“These guys lived near streams in Panama, which ranged from large, deep streams to smaller streams. It’s very tropical and dense, with a different climate, and higher elevations,” says Adamski.
Thanks to this ideal environment, Seneca Park Zoo’s male and female Panamanian golden frogs were able to mate and hatch four more golden frogs for the first time last year on April 18, 2022.
“The difficulty in zoos to raise animals is that we have to feed them such small invertebrates to start off with,” says Adamski. “Even fruit flies were too big, so I spent my whole last summer collecting bugs from the side of the hill and screening them. We were able to harvest straight from the soil here and then once they got old enough like they are now, they’re eating quite well with fruit flies and small crickets.”
Golden frogs hold a lot of cultural significance in Panama, so much so that they hold a national, week-long Golden Frog Festival, or Festival de la Rana Dorada. Dating back to pre-Columbian times, these golden frogs were symbols of good luck, so this festival is held to raise awareness about conservation efforts to save the golden frogs. The festival will eventually end once these frogs have regained their numbers and can be returned safely back to the wild in Panama.
The golden frogs’ luck truly shines in evading total extinction, but there’s no telling how much longer it can be prevented. With the help of conservation efforts and spreading awareness, hopefully these golden frogs will continue to reproduce and thrive.