The Times reports they are the grassroots environmentalists. Volunteers are collecting thousands of toads and frogs in buckets and placing them near rivers in a bid to save them from cars and trucks thundering along Scotland’s roads.
Dozens of new “toad patrols” are being set up to help amphibians avoid being squashed flat as numbers decline. It is estimated 20 tonnes of toads a year are crushed by cars and lorries as they attempt to reach their breeding sites around the UK. Experts say the patrols’ efforts are saving about 80,000 toads annually.
A deadly “salamander-eating” fungus that is already causing havoc for European amphibians is rife in the pet trade, prompting fears it could spread to the UK’s vulnerable newts, report the Independent.
In a study partly funded by the British government, scientists found that seven of the 11 private amphibian collections tested from Western Europe were positive for the “Bsal” infection.
The disease is caused by Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans, a fungus that has spread like wildfire from Asia and killed 99 per cent of fire salamanders in the Netherlands.
Experts are concerned some of the UK’s newts, which are already teetering on the edge of extinction thanks to habitat loss and intensive farming, could be the next victims of this plague.
Everybody who cares about wildlife will be gathering in central London on 22nd September 2018 for the first People’s Walk for Wildlife. And we know you care about wildlife because your reading this, so please join us there.
Watch this short video for one of the most passionate and yet down to earth explanations of why we have to wake up to what is happening to British wildlife and act. Chris Packham says of our wildlife population’s downward trends “those statistics about those declines become normalised. Like it’s just another part of the conversation”.
He continues “We’re in trouble, we’re in big trouble…… It’s time for us to act. I think it’s time for us to stand up and be counted, and to ask, politely, for things to be fixed”.
Please join this polite, passive walk (it’s not a demonstration or rally) and show your concern for what is happening to our wildlife – whether your interest is for birds, hedgehogs, dragonflies, ferns, trees, fungi or any other of the diverse, beautiful and essential plants and animals that keep our environment healthy.
If your interested in going and want to travel by train with other members of FNW please let me know so we can co-ordinate travel arrangements or arrange to meet in London.
10am: Gather – Reformers Tree, Hyde Park, London
12 noon: Infotainment
1pm: Walk
2pm: Finish – Richmond Terrace
