It is no secret, PA Woods and Forests selected specific organisms for our project for a purpose beyond keeping frogs and co. in captivity. PA Woods and Forests has special interests in many ecological details surrounding flora and fauna chosen. The conservation project 'Frog Week' features both; main creatures in this project: American toads and wood frogs. The goal of Frog Week is to perform citizen science surveys, and to monitor, road rescue, and preserve offspring for specific frogs and toads while filming all frogs and toads we observe. We are specifically interested in the relationship and the individual traits both species of anurans demonstrate. We want to give back and help positively contribute to both species in-situ.
Both anurans are of top priority, but other creatures, both; flora, and fauna are considered target species and are of utter importance for PA Woods and Forests. One of the most important creatures is the northern purple pitcher plant. We have written about this plant many times on the website, and we are starting to film it in videos on our YouTube channel. We are serious about working with different organizations and other places to introduce the plant to more habitats and preserve the native specimens in the peat bogs around Pennsylvania. We also focused on preserving and conserving other plants like goldenrod, berry bushes, and many wildflowers.
Invertebrates are important for the success of both anurans and the pitcher plant. We focus on working with the white-lip globe snail, giant North American millipede, many solitary bees, carpenter ants, and other inverts. These creatures need to thrive for the anurans and pitcher plants to eat. Invertebrates are fascinating in their way, and we are often drawn to the macro world more with our focus on conservation and preservation.
Many of the creatures mentioned above will be involved somehow in the exhibit room and contribute to the exhibit ecosystem. We often stumble across many types of creatures when looking for frogs and toads, and the critters we found we considered strongly; when constructing the ecosystem for the exhibit. We are utterly fascinated to display the interactions between multiple organisms inside the main enclosure of the 225-gallon habitat. We are very excited to be working with different carpenter ants and canyon isopods. Both inverts will be major prey items for the anurans. Both isopods and carpenter ants are eaten in the wild by both species. Not only are the findings from research papers in agreement with the prey items, but we have seen both species eat ants and isopods from personal observation.
We are hopeful to discuss information about our sponsors and partners for this project very soon. We are also optimistic to give more information about tech and the various exhibits that will contribute to the main 225-gallon enclosure.
