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Eutrophication Implicated In Deformed Frogs According to ecologists Pieter Johnson at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and Jonathan Chase at Washington University in St. Louis, the dramatic rise in the number of frog deformities can be traced, in part, to an increase in the eutrophication of waters where tadpoles hatch and metamorphose into frogs. The researchers link the presence of a parasitic trematode, Ribeiroia ondatrae, to the growing number of ponds swamped by nutrients. Eutrophic ponds are often home to the "ramshorn" snails of the family Planorbidae. The snails are an essential host in the life cycle of the parasitic trematode. The scientists found that ponds with higher phosphorus levels generally have more of the host ramshorn snails. Johnson and Chase also found that the number of amphibian infections was higher when the snail population was higher at 16 malformation hot spots in the western and central United States.
http://pubs.acs.org/subscribe/journals/esthagw/2004/sep/science/
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