Rediscovering the 'snoring’ dusky gopher frog and restoring longleaf pine forests for the rare species

by Sarah Farmer

Rediscovering the 'snoring’ dusky gopher frog and restoring longleaf pine forests for the rare species

Sarah Farmer
Southern Research Station
March 20, 2023

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Click here to hear the dusky gopher frog’s snoring croak. These frogs spend most of their adult lives in longleaf pine forests. Courtesy audio by Louisiana Dept. of Wildlife and Fisheries. Courtesy photo by CJ Hillard, Western Carolina University.

In 1987, Glen Johnson heard the call of the dusky gopher frog, which sounds like a snore. He was the first to report hearing its call since the 1950s. He found a breeding population of the dusky gopher frog at a pond on the De Soto National Forest in Mississippi.

Johnson, a Forest Service technician at the time, also founded a herpetological society with his brothers and some friends. By night, they drove down dirt roads through the forest, listening for frogs and looking for snakes. They’d gotten a tip about where to look.

Over the coming years, people from many organizations would coalesce around the pond and its small, warty frogs. “I can’t even tell you how many graduate students have gotten degrees here,” said Chuck Burdine, a technician at the nearby Harrison Experimental Forest.

The researchers monitored the pond. Every year between 1997 and 2005, all the tadpoles died because the water in the pond dried up before the they could finish metamorphosis. Researchers at Southeastern Louisiana University tried bringing water to the pond. “They’d truck water in or pump it in from the well 24 hours a day,” says John Tupy. “It wasn’t sustainable.”

Today, Tupy works for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He became involved with the frogs through Joseph Pechmann, a Western Carolina University researcher and biology professor who started collecting eggs and raising tadpoles in cattle tanks next to Glen’s Pond.

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Dusky gopher frogs need shallow ponds that get plenty of sunshine. These ponds used to be abundant, but many have been lost to development. Courtesy photo by CJ Hillard, Western Carolina University.

In 2016, the cattle tanks were moved to the Harrison Experimental Forest. The tanks provide safer waters for the tadpoles. They are free from predators and, unlike the ponds, can be kept full of water. After 2001, the dusky gopher frog was federally listed as an endangered species, so the team got permits from U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as well as the state of Mississippi.

Like other frogs, the life of a dusky gopher frog begins in the water. The adult female lays eggs in ephemeral ponds – but only after heavy rains, only on plant stems and only in sun-warmed ponds with the right pH.

After metamorphosis, the frogs are released to ponds and will hop away toward the uplands. They will spend most of their adult lives in longleaf pine forests.

Dusky gopher frogs are among the hundreds of species that live in longleaf pine forests. After nearly vanishing – about 99% of the longleaf pine acres growing in the year 1700 are gone – there are now about 5 million acres of longleaf pine ecosystem.

When longleaf pines are healthy, other species can flourish along with them.

Fire is an essential ingredient in a healthy longleaf pine ecosystem and across the South, land managers conduct prescribed fires to restore and maintain these ecosystems.

Fire is an essential ingredient in a healthy longleaf pine ecosystem. Without fire, the frogs’ habitat would vanish. Prescribed burns renew the frogs' habitat, a huge benefit for the species. USDA Forest Service photo by Virginia McDaniel.

On the De Soto National Forest, longleaf pine restoration has an added beneficiary, the dusky gopher frog. The teams of managers, wildlife experts and equipment operators have also made ponds deeper - less likely to dry out - and sunnier, which makes the water warmer.

And researchers continue to watch over the frogs. “We installed drift fences to monitor their populations,” says Tupy. “We track every one of them.”

People have gone to great lengths for the “snoring” dusky gopher frog. Very few ponds meet their breeding requirements and despite the progress made, it is still on the edge of extinction. But for now, these frogs continue to exist, hopping through the piney woods and singing their snoring song every winter.

Partner Acknowledgement

In addition to the Forest Service, Western Carolina University and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, researchers from the Nature Conservancy, the Memphis Zoo, Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks, and many other universities and organizations have contributed to the recovery of the dusky gopher frog.

Longleaf pine’s comeback is due to a concerted effort from many people and organizations, including The Nature Conservancy, the Longleaf Alliance, Tall Timbers Research Station and others, including the Forest Service. For example, the Forest Service Southern Research Station developed some of the practices that made replanting possible, such as the best methods for collecting seeds and planting seedlings.