On December 18th and 19th, Siler Lab grad student Greg Jongsma, and his wife, Andi Emerich, visited the New Brunswick Museum in Canada and swabbed 475 amphibians to test for chytrid fungus.

The specimens were collected in New Brunswick between 1955 and 2010. Our hope is that understanding the historical prevalence of infectious amphibian diseases will shed light on current threats to biodiversity in eastern Canada.

This is part of a larger project that involves field work in Protected Natural Areas around the province, where we are documenting the prevalence of chytrid fungus and ranavirus, both major threats to amphibians world-wide.

Siler Lab undergraduate, Rachel Flanagan, is also sampling for historical chytrid in Oklahoma.  Read her story here.