

Last December, Mea Trenor found herself at dusk in South Africa’s Natal highlands picking through undergrowth desperately trying to find a frog. Not just any frog, but a cryptic, endangered amphibian that pretty much no one has ever heard of: the mistbelt chirping frog. Trenor, and her team of “froggers,” had located the frog’s general location by listening for its telltale song, but now they had to find a lone male no bigger than a fingernail in the fading light.



“We knew the frog was right there, within the square meter in front of us,” Trenor wrote in a blog for the the Zoological Society of London’s (ZSL) Evolutionarily Distinct and Globally Endangered (Edge) programme, which is funding her work. “Yet it took three experienced froggers almost 20 minutes’ of triangulation, on our knees, digging through pine needles and grass to finally see it. It was a beautiful moment.”

Mea Trenor with the mistbelt chirping frog. Photograph: Mea Trenor

Beautiful, because this was Trenor’s first – and to date only – encounter with her endangered research subject.

Trenor didn’t begin her professional career as a frog conservationist. Far from it. For seven years she worked in the advertising and magazine industry, first as a fashion editor for Atoll Media and then as editor of Saltwater Girl, a consumer magazine for teenage girls in South Africa. While this might be a dream job for some young women, it took its toll on Trenor.

“I felt despondent and like I wasn’t contributing anything to saving our beautiful planet,” she said. “Nothing quite like being immersed in a world where consumerism is shoved down your throat to leave you feeling empty and in need of a new perspective, right?”

So, she quit her job and went back to school for zoology. Six years later, she became a fellow for the Edge Programme focused on an obscure little amphibian called the chirping mistbelt frog (Anhydrophryne ngongoniensis).

“I never chose frogs, they kind of chose me,” said Trenor, who is currently a master’s student at North-West University and a member of the African Amphibian Conservation Research Group. “I understand that all species are important in the web of life, we can’t just want to save the ones that are cute or impressive to the masses.”

It was this philosophy that attracted Trenor to the Edge programme, which she said “aims to protect our evolutionary heritage.”

Grassland landscapes where the mistbelt chirping frog lives. In the background are tree plantations. Photograph: Mea Trenor

Edge is arguably the world’s most unusual conservation initiative. Instead of focusing on species that are “charismatic” and likely to bring in big funders, ZSL conservationists wanted a more scientific way of picking their targets. They developed a mathematical formula to combine how endangered a species is – based on the IUCN Red List – and how bizarre it is or, scientifically speaking, evolutionarily distinct.



“These are species which are unique in the way they look, live and behave, have few or no close relatives on the tree of life, and are on the brink of extinction,” explained Nisha Owen, the programme manager at ZSL’s Edge.

Since 2007, the Edge programme has crafted lists of the top 100 Edge species in various animals groups, including mammals, amphibians and birds. The mistbelt chirping frog just made the amphibian list, coming in at number 100.

Researchers set up audio survey equipment at one of the grassland sites. They surveyed the frogs through the songs of males. Photograph: Mea Trenor

Only found in the high-altitude grasslands of South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal province, the mistbelt chirping frog is distinct for a number of reasons. For one thing this species skips the tadpole stage, so its eggs produce fully-formed froglets, even tinier dopplegangers of the adults. Although an amphibian, these frogs spend none of their lifecycle in water. Moreover, the species belongs to a family of amphibians, the Pyxicephalidae, that split off from other amphibians 70 million years ago.

To put this in perspective, Owen noted that “whales are more closely related to pigs than these frogs are to any other amphibian.”

And like so many amphibians today, the mistbelt chirping frog is facing down extinction. Conservationists believe only 3,000 or so survive in a few populations in a range spreading over 1,500 sq km – about the area of greater London. But many of the populations are thought to be unconnected and the frog is believed to actually inhabit only 0.6% of its range.



“The frog is found in small patches of grassland and indigenous forest that are surrounded by enormous agricultural forestry plantations,” explained Trenor. “This limits the movement of the frogs [and] we believe it could affect populations on a genetic level. But a lot more research is needed.”

Trenor, whose project is also supported by the Auckland Zoo Conservation Fund and the Endangered Wildlife Trust South Africa, is now working with the plantations to create better management practices in order to safeguard the frogs, such as clearing invasive species, improving burning regimes and minimising cattle grazing.

I’m not necessarily changing the world but I do believe in what I do, and that changed my world. Mea Trenor

“If I had my way, every little piece of nature left on this planet would be a reserve. But if we can get the land owners to manage their land in a way that would benefit the frog, then we’re already winning,” she said, noting that the companies in question “seem to be totally on board the conservation train.”

Only discovered in 1993, the mistbelt chirping frog is actually quite fortunate to have a conservationist paying any attention to it. The vast majority of the world’s uncharismatic, little species are left out in the cold by conservation groups.



“I love the big charismatic animals as much as everyone else ... but, wow, it’s scary to see how imbalanced funding for conservation is when it comes to less iconic species,” said Trenor.

This is the tide the Edge programme is trying to swim against – to save obscure, little-loved and sometimes patently ugly (from a human perspective) species from extinction.

“Overlooked by the conservation agenda, when [these species] are gone there will be nothing like them left on Earth,” said Owen. “Many of them are receiving little or no conservation attention, and would be lost forever without ZSL’s work and the work of our Edge Fellows.”

For Trenor, she’s happy about the decision she has made. Not only is she working to save species from extinction, but she’s also still using her media savvy to make wildlife films.

“I’m not necessarily changing the world but I do believe in what I do, and that changed my world,” she said.

If Trenor’s work on the mistbelt chirping frog succeeds, she will also be changing the circumstances for one of the planets millions – literally millions – of innocuous species.