I am happy to announce the launch of a RAD new Tumblog: lacartaajena. Please welcome Kara — aka, my most prolific commenter — to Tumblr. We’re glad you’re here!
If you have the time and the inclination, visit the FROGS exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History.
Jay and I visited the museum last weekend to see Journey to the Stars, a new “space show” narrated by Whoopi Goldberg. As long as we were shelling out for one “special exhibit,” we felt little compunction about shelling out for more. So we did it up right. Accordingly, our visit cost approximately $6 million.
The graphics of the space show are amazing. It’s a bit short, though, for grown-ups. Whoopi draws you in with all her cool star talk, getting you really excited about all you’re going to see and learn, and then the lights go up and the doors open. It’s a bit of a let-down. Just too brief.
We had just the opposite experience with the frogs exhibit. The AMNH’s herpetologists (that means amphibian-ologist — not student of a certain venereal ailment) have put together a number of lovely exhibits of LIVE FROGS from all over the world. The brightly colored South American species are simply incredible. It’s hard to believe, even as you look at them, that such creatures exist.
If you’re uneasy about the museum corralling these delicate, live creatures for our viewing pleasure (as I was), the video at the end of the exhibit might help. In it, a herpetologist discusses a particular danger to frogs living in the wild — an easily-spread fungus that is wiping out frog populations around the world. Individual frogs can be treated in captivity, but scientists are powerless to stop the spread of the fungus or to treat entire frog habitats. In order to save threatened populations — some of which represent the last of their species — herpetologists must capture members of each population, treat them, and attempt to breed the frogs in captivity.
In other words, we can’t just leave them alone. And the museum’s herpetologists are contributing to the preservation of these wonderful creatures.
Photo of fire-bellied toad by Joe McDonald courtesy of AMNH.
