Garden pond owners/gardeners have traditionally shared frogspawn with other people for years, yet latest expert advice suggests that this habit is not without environmental risk.
The Froglife charity has warned that frogspawn sharing may not be a good idea. They said wildlife-lovers should not worry that there is too much frogspawn in their ponds, because frogs lay thousands of eggs on the basis that only the strongest handful will survive to breed.
The charity also warned that selling frogspawn, tadpoles or frogs in the UK is illegal and it monitored internet auction sites each spring to ensure the law was not being broken.
Research suggests that frogspawn may carry a disease passed down from adults called Ranavirus.
This is comparatively new to the UK and has killed thousands of frogs each year since emerging in south-east England in the late 1980s.
Daniel Piec, Head of Conservation at Froglife, said:
"Sadly, moving frogspawn around often serves only to heighten the risk of moving around invasive plants and diseases that have potential to do real harm to frogs and other pond-inhabitants."
"If you want to do the best for our wildlife, our advice is to leave frogspawn where it is and let nature do the rest," he added.
https://www.froglife.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/AHD-final.pdf
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7282649.stm
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