Citizen ‘Frog Patrol’ helps toads cross road

OTREBUSY, Poland (AP):

On rainy spring nights in a forest near the Polish capital, a citizen 'Frog Patrol' springs into action -- humans helping amphibians survive dangerous road crossings for a chance to enjoy millennia-old mating rituals.

As warmer weather comes to Mlochowski Forest, 30 19 miles west of Warsaw, thousands of toads and frogs wake up from their winter slumber and begin their meticulous spawning journey to the marshes, a few kilometres away.

The females carry the burden of the journey. Male toads here don't really give off princely vibes but travel on the backs of their much larger female partners, tightly holding on to ensure they are not dumped in favour of a rival upon reaching the waters.

While generations of toads and frogs have travelled to these marshes to mate, a road built in the last decade right across their route made the spring journey much more dangerous.

What followed was sheer amphibian slaughter -- when the mating season started and the frogs were on the move, thousands would get run over.

Enter the 'Frog Patrol'

Lukasz Franczuk, coordinator of the 'Frog Patrol' initiative, recounted the sad scenes from four years ago.

"The frogs were being run over in the hundreds or thousands," he said. "When you were driving on this road, you could see the decomposing corpses of the frogs. People going to collect the surviving ones were crying, they couldn't stand to watch what was happening."

Franczuk and his friends responded by helping locals organize, starting three years ago.

Volunteers would meet every wet, rainy evening as soon as spring starts, fan out along the road by the forest and collect frogs from the roadside, then carry them safely across to the marshes. Frogs breathe through their skin, which must stay humid, so they only move and migrate when it rains.

Wearing reflective yellow vests emblazoned with the words 'Frog Patrol' and armed with head lamps and buckets, hundreds of volunteers can now be routinely seen out in the evenings during migration season.

Locals, including children, have also started carrying gloves with them during the day, so they can pick up the amphibians if they see them in distress at any time.

"It's really impressive to see whole families with kids walking in the rain, with buckets, in these lovely jackets to make them visible because it's pretty unsafe, this road is narrow, and they carry the frogs from one side of the road to the other," said Katarzyna Jacniacka, one of the participants.

Locals say they have saved about 18,000 amphibians since their initiative started.