Frog study plan angers

Press, 14 June 1984, Page 18

Frog study plan angers

NZPA-APTrenton, New Jersey

Animal protection groups are fighting a graduate student’s plan to track 10 frogs through New Jersey’s vast pine barrens by placing radioactive wires round their necks. Both sides claim to be friends of the Pine Barrens tree frog, a colourful critter that eludes herpetologists — (scientists who study reptiles and amphibians) —

because it is less than scm long and climbs trees and burrows. The Pine Barrens tree frog was on the Federal endangered species list until last year, when researchers found it in more than 100 communities in the Florida panhandle and in North Carolina.

A Pennsylvania State University researcher, Mr Joseph Freda, decided he might be able to save the species habitat from de-

velopers if he could spy on the frogs long enough to find out exactly where they lived and how far they travelled.

Friends of Animals group members disagreed and appealed to the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which ordered Mr Freda not to use radioactive tantalum or cobalt, as had been planned. The commission was interested in any possible threat to humans.

Mr Freda switched to Chromium 51, which can be used in small quantities without a licence because it decays faster and emits no beta rays. Recently, he spied on his first frog. Ms Suzanne Young of the Friends of Animals group has asked the State Department of Environmental Protection to halt the study until an environmental impact statement is prepared on nine frogs yet to receive necklaces.