Yasuni National Park, Ecuador: An Amphibian Eden

Yasuni National Park, courtesy UTNE.com

Scientists have recently identified Yasuni National Park in Ecuador as one of the most biologically diverse places in South America, and perhaps on earth. As Shawn McCracken of Texas State University—San Marcos, recently said, “The 150 amphibian species throughout Yasuni is a world record for an area this size. There are more species of frogs and toads within Yasuni than are native to the United States and Canada combined.”

Unfortunately this Eden sits on oil reserves and is threatened by proposed oil development projects. McCracken and other scientists from Ecuador, the United States, and Europe have proposed a moratorium on new oil exploration until the effects of such projects can be explored.

Reading about this, we couldn’t help but think about the movie Avatar and the attempted destruction of the planet Pandora to mine unobtanium. Unfortunately, we humans aren’t as wise as the Na’vi—yet. Let’s hope that Ecuador will preserve this incredible pocket of biodiversity and not be so shortsighted as to destroy parts of it for oil.

Here is more information from Save the Frogs and the Environmental News Service.

Tags: Austin, Avatar, Avatar the movie, biodiversity in the rainforest, Ecuador, Eden, Pandora, San Marcos, save the frogs, Texas State University, University of Texas, Yasuni and frogs, Yasuni National Park

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 26th, 2010 at 8:28 am and is filed under Amphibian habitat loss, Deforestation and frogs, Frogs and the Rainforest, Rainforest Frogs, habitat loss. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Yasuni National Park, Ecuador: An Amphibian Eden”

Diana Elena Antonescu says:

February 15, 2010 at 8:36 am

l would like to give my full support to SAVE THE FROGS
and protecting YASUNI NATIONAL PARK in ECUADOR.

We must remember the Web of Life.
We do not Weave the Web of Life
we are merely a strand in it:
and what we do to the web we do to ourselves.

When you have cut down the last of the trees,
polluted the last of the rivers,
hunted the last of the animals,
then you will see that you cannot eat money.

l do pray that a way can be found to save
this amhibian Eden from the greed of the developers.
l urge them to think of the heritage they will leave
their children and also of the Midas touch.