Tree Walkers International - United to save amphibians

[TreeWalkers]

Oct. 1, 2006

Tree Walkers International is now open for membership.

TWI was formed in response to the global decline of amphibian populations as a way for private individuals to become directly involved in amphibian conservation. Members and volunteers are needed to develop and support two important amphibian conservation initiatives.

The Amphibian Steward Network is designed to harness the skills and expertise of private amphibian enthusiasts through captive breeding programs that benefit wild amphibian populations. Through ASN, private enthusiasts can help reverse declining trends in wild amphibian populations by:

• Wisely managing existing captive amphibian populations to reduce the pet-trade demand for animals collected from the wild.
  
  Support environmentally-sensitive and sustainable collection, importation, and distribution practices that support local economies where the animals live in the wild.
  
  Provide training and support that allows volunteer stewards to participate in amphibian conservation breeding programs, vastly expanding the capacity of zoos, aquaria, and other professional institutions.

Operation Frog Pond encourages people to act locally by creating amphibian habitat in their own backyards, schools and parks. This initiative is designed to capitalize on the growing popularity of ornamental water gardens. OFP volunteers can participate as research associates who collect data and report their findings to improve our ability to reverse declines of local amphibian projects through small-scale habitat improvement projects.

To learn more about Tree Walkers International and become a member, please visit our website at: http://www.treewalkers.org

We welcome you and look forward to working united to save amphibians.

Signed,

Marcos Osorno,
Project Director

Steering Committee and Project Leads:
César L. Barrio, Brent Brock, Jason Brown, Christina Hanson, Paul Crump, Ben Eiben, Tracy Hicks, Todd Kelley, Ed Kowalski, Tor Linbo, Scott P. McRobert, Lars Österdahl, Mark Pepper, and Justin Yeager.

[bbrock]

Below are a few links to orgs working at least in part to rescue/restore imperiled wild amphibian populations through captive breeding:

http://www.amphibianark.org/

http://www.cbsg.org/

http://saveafrog.org/

http://www.treewalkers.org/

http://www.globalamphibians.org/

Tree Walkers is hoping to work with all of these groups to bring the skills of the hobbyists to the arsenal fighting to save amphibians.

[bbrock]

Tree Walkers has a number of volunteer opportunities which can be viewed at:
http://www.treewalkers.org/forum

[bbrock]

The Amphibian Steward Network is now operational.

The ASN handbook can be downloaded from the ASN website at: http://www.treewalkers.org/projects/ASN/. There is also an ASN Pocket Guide that describes the program and being a steward without all of the technical and administrative hoo ha included in the complete handbook. These handbooks and the Steward Application are available to anyone but you do need to join TWI to become a steward.

[citypill]

Hey BBROCK,

I just tried to submit my application fro ASN and it wouldnt let me submit by pressing the button at the bottom of the form. Is this because I am workin on a MAC in Safari browser. I really look forward to joining up and registering my frogs. Also does it change my name here to a different color...haha :lol:

[jbeetle]

I'm not Brent, but I had similar problems when I tried to sign up with ASN and register animals. The problem was that my MAC opened the forms in a preview program and not Adobe Reader. After I installed the newest version of Adobe Reader the forms worked just fine. Not sure if you are having the exact same problem, but sounds a lot like what happened to me so figured I'd throw it out there.

[bbrock]

Yeah, downloading the latest version of Adobe Reader has solved most of the problems with form submission. Matt Mirabello is processing the forms now and he just posted a message on the TWI forums about this: http://www.treewalkers.org/forum/index. ... 356.0.html

[FrogBoyMike]

just saw the post about the event in march in san diego! super excited! sounds great

[ForbiddenFrogs]

id like to join TWI, kinda new to the big aspects of the PDF world but im in love with the lil guys and would very much like to help