LIVE FROGS INSIDE ROCKS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17759, 1 February 1926, Page 6

LIVE FROGS INSIDE ROCKS.

WASHED INTO CRACKS WHEN TADPOLES. The presence of live frogs in apparently solid rock, a case of which was reported in the Westminster G izette recently, was discussed with an official of the Natural History Department of the British Museum. The frog was found alive at lienddol Quarries, near Barmouth, by workmen drilling the solid rock 200 ft down the mountain side. “ This rock.” he said, "was formed before the carboniferous period—before frogs were thought of. “ No one has yet received any good evidence of frogs having been found inside solid rock, although it is admittedly difficult to give any explanation of how they come to be where they are sometimes found. “ We had a case a few weeks ago where a workman in a chalk pit found, or thought he found, a live frog embedded in a flint. “ Frogs often hibernate in crevices of rock, and as tadpoles they can be washed into minute cracks and holes.” Dr Gadow, of Cambridge, carried out experiments by sealing two halves of a piece of rock, together, after placing a live frog in a cavity. lie discovered that only in the porous rocks did the frogs live for any length of time, and then for only three weeks at the most.”