{"id":277863,"date":"2026-02-11T01:40:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T01:40:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/277863\/"},"modified":"2026-02-11T01:40:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T01:40:08","slug":"frog-wiped-out-by-disease-returns-to-the-wild-with-the-help-of-frog-spas-and-frog-saunas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/277863\/","title":{"rendered":"Frog Wiped Out by Disease Returns to the Wild With the Help of &#8216;Frog Spas&#8217; and &#8216;Frog Saunas&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>        <img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-229429\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Releasing-green-and-golden-bell-frogs-back-in-the-wild-Credit-University-of-Canberra-1024x545.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"696\" height=\"370\"  \/>Releasing a green and golden bell frog back in the wild \u2013 Credit: University of Canberra<\/p>\n<p>This beautiful amphibian is being reintroduced to wetlands around Australia\u2019s capital of Canberra after suffering a population collapse due to chytrid fungus.<\/p>\n<p>Called the green and golden bell frog, these animals were bred in captivity and will be released in groups of 15 into ponds and wetlands having been immunized against a disease caused by the fungus.<\/p>\n<p>They will also be let free in areas where \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.goodnewsnetwork.org\/tiny-frog-saunas-help-endangered-amphibians-fight-off-fungal-disease\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">frog saunas<\/a>\u201d have been built\u2014basically piles of black bricks covered in a pyramid of rigid plastic sheets. The slots and holes in the bricks are perfect for the frogs to shelter in, and at toasty temperatures lethal to the chytrid fungus.<\/p>\n<p>Chytrid has been responsible for extinctions and population collapses all over the world, and scientists are only <a href=\"https:\/\/www.goodnewsnetwork.org\/fungus-devastating-frogs-on-nearly-every-continent-may-have-an-achilles-heel-and-scientists-think-it-could-save-the-amphibians\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">just now getting a handle<\/a> on how to protect amphibians from it.<\/p>\n<p>The green and golden bell frogs have mercifully been spared from such a fate, and scientists working at the University of Canberra to restore them to the wild felt the reintroduction has been a little like watching your children move out of the house for the first time.<\/p>\n<p>Associate Professor Simon Clulow said it was \u201cquite incredible,\u201d for \u201cas far as we\u2019re aware, it went extinct [in the ACT] by about 1981.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>ACT stands for Australian Capital Territory, the special administrative zone around Canberra.<\/p>\n<p>180 of the frog saunas have been installed around the ponds where over 300 captive-bred frogs will be released. Each female can produce around 8,000 eggs in a single mating season, so while the population is predicted to proliferate rapidly, the offspring will not be immune to the chytrid. For them, the saunas should help.<\/p>\n<p>CHECK OUT THESE FROGS:\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe pathogen itself is quite susceptible to elevated temperature\u2014it doesn\u2019t like temperatures over 25C; 27 or 28C is quite lethal to it,\u201d Clulow <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/australia-news\/2026\/feb\/03\/green-and-golden-bell-frogs-return-act-wetlands-chytrid-fungal-disease\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">told the Guardian<\/a>. \u201cA lot of Australian frogs \u2026 prefer those temperatures\u2014the green and golden bell frog likes to be about 30C.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>30\u00b0C is around 88\u00b0 Fahrenheit. Outside the ACT, the frogs have clung on in isolated pools where the water contains a little salinity, and these have also been picked out in the ACT as the ideal relocation sites\u2014and named \u2018frog spas,\u2019 for their warm, slightly saline water and sauna compliment.<\/p>\n<p>The goal is to quickly reach around 200 of these frogs at each of the 15 ponds.<\/p>\n<p>SHARE These Beautiful Frogs And Their Harrowing Brush With Oblivion\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Releasing a green and golden bell frog back in the wild \u2013 Credit: University of Canberra This beautiful&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277864,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[85,6819,3647,1391,111,139,69,147,406],"class_list":{"0":"post-277863","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-australia","9":"tag-endangered-species","10":"tag-extinct","11":"tag-frogs","12":"tag-new-zealand","13":"tag-newzealand","14":"tag-nz","15":"tag-science","16":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}