Friendly frogs help residents think green

Friendly frogs help residents think green

Published on 08 June 2021

Many City residents will be jumping into action following a Frog Friendly Gardens workshop at Dayton Community Centre, led by ecologists Mike and Mandy Bamford.

Mike and Mandy Bamford educated participants about the diversity of frogs found in our urban areas and local bushland and what we can do in our own gardens to help them out.

Residents took home knowledge about creating frog friendly gardens and also, their very own pond or bog plant. 

Throughout the presentation a friendly Motorbike frog impressed attendees with various poses. Mike and Mandy have a licence to keep frogs for educational purposes and clearly this friendly fellow relished the opportunity for some attention.

You can make your garden more frog friendly by: 

Leaving gaps in fences and creating smaller levels or slopes. Using branches to create stairs and bridges in and out of raised garden beds, pools and pond. Creating areas for frogs to inhabit, shelter in and move through. Connected garden areas with native reed, grass and sedge species are best. Using submerged, floating and fringing plants in your pond to create habitat and hiding spaces, safe from predators. Avoiding or limiting use of herbicides and pesticides, as frogs absorb chemicals through their skin. You should also avoid touching frogs so they aren’t exposed to the oils from our skin. Avoiding moving frogs as this can spread disease and fungal infections.

Interested in finding out more about frogs? There are more frog species than mammal species in the world! Check out the Australian Museum’s FrogID website or app to find out what frog species are near you and what they sound like.

Frogs can move between wetland areas and urban areas, and can travel kilometres. If you create the right environment in your backyard, frogs will find their way to it.

To find out about future workshops in the Thinking Green series subscribe to the City's Sustainable Environment events eNewsletter and visit the Thinking Green web page.