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American bullfrogs mustn’t be confused with lake’s ‘good’ frogs

NANAIMO: Local lake being overrun by invasive species.

 

To the Editor,

Quennell Lake in the Yellow Point-Cedar area is currently seeing a large population of frogs and American bullfrogs that are in the tadpole and juvenile stage.

I have seen this once before in the past 15 years in this lake, which is usually dirty green with algae and is known to be spring fed with little water flow.

The algae may be natural, but may also be caused by runoff from farms or septic fields. The abundance of bullfrogs has done an amazing job of cleaning up the excess nutrients in the water in the past few months and it is nearly clean of all slime.

Alarmists may start a witch hunt when they read this letter, but the idea that these have surfaced twice in 15 years and appear to serve a purpose must be noted.

There are more than just a few frogs in the lake – I would guess 100,000 or more. They pool together and the lake appears to boil with them.

They also curb their own population as food runs out and will cannibalize themselves into the adult stage. The survivors will become the size of a dinner plate and dominate a shoreline.

My concern is people may get the idea to move a bullfrog to another lake or stream which will dominate a habitat and overrun other small animals. The other concern is the killing off of ‘good’ frogs natural to the area.

If people decide to go on a witch hunt, please learn how to identify the American bullfrog.

Matt James

Nanaimo