Frog

Frogs have evolved to live in an astounding variety of climates. They can be found just about anywhere there’s fresh water, from the desert to the Arctic, on all continents except Antarctica. Though they thrive in warm, moist tropical climates, frogs also live in deserts and high on 15,000 foot mountain slopes. The Australian water-holding frog is a desert dweller that can wait up to seven years for rain. It burrows underground and surrounds itself in a transparent cocoon made of its own shed skin.
The Frog Tracker lets you listen to the calls of different North American frogs. All of the sounds you hear are “sound loops” — in nature, the calls of individual frogs have more range and variance. Frogs have been making their calls for hundreds of millions of years. Most frog calls are used to attract a mate during springtime. However, some frogs will call year round, whether they are mating or not. Each species of frog has its own unique call. To learn more about frog calls, visit
magine traveling back through time millions of years to the age of the dinosaurs. Pterodactyls glide above a soggy marsh. NearLY, a colossal 80-ton Brachiosaurus munches on a tree. On the ground at its feet, something strangely familiar hops by: a frog.
Frogs have a reputation for leaping that is well deserved. Launched by their long legs, many frogs can leap up to twenty times their body length. (That would be about a 100-foot jump for you or me!) The longest frog jump on record was made by a frog named Santjie at a frog derby held in South Africa. Santjie bested the competition with a jump of 33 feet 5.5 inches.

The time-honored mantra of those who study cryopreservation is that a living organ can only be preserved if the formation of ice crystals is utterly avoided. But the wood frog and other denizens of the Great White North have led Rubinsky to reject this notion in favor of a new one: If ice crystals cannot be wholly prevented, at least their propagation can be controlled — with startling results.