When a frog bites off more than it can chew, it has an advantage over a human who does the same: Frogs can pull in their eyes through the roofs of their mouths to help push the food down their throats.
That is one of many little factoids sprinkled through a new museum exhibit that is surprising on several levels, including the place where it is opening. It’s not at the Shedd Aquarium, which had its own highly successful frog exhibit 10 years ago, or at Brookfield or Lincoln Park Zoo, or even the Field Museum.
Instead, “Frogs! A Chorus of Colors” will run through Jan. 7 at the Museum of Science and Industry, a place not normally noted for exhibits of wild animals.
“It shouldn’t be a surprise that we are featuring a living frog exhibit like this,” said museum spokeswoman Lisa Miner. “It’s a natural fit for us to have them here, because they are a great example of science at work.”
In fact, frogs were underfoot during the age of dinosaurs and have long been of interest to scientists. Their extremely thin skin makes them particularly vulnerable to environmental changes, and these days their numbers are mysteriously and dramatically declining.
The exhibit features 150 frogs from 15 countries around the world. They demonstrate the extraordinary magnitudes of colors, sizes and lifestyles that the world’s roughly 5,000 frog species encompass.
Even the names of many featured species suggest exotic places or tickle the fancy: Chinese gliding frog, Mexican dumpy frog, Vietnamese mossy frog, smoky jungle frog and waxy monkey frog.
The smallest frogs in the exhibit are beautiful, jewel-like golden mantella frogs from Madagascar, barely half an inch long. The world’s largest, the African Goliath frog, grows to 15 inches long and reaches 7 pounds. The exhibit doesn’t have a live specimen, but a skeleton of the hefty creature is on display.
The largest living species in the exhibit is no slouch, an 8-inch-long African bullfrog. He doesn’t look mean, but members of his species have a peculiar feature: After swimming around as tadpoles with their brothers and sisters for a couple of years, the first ones to metamorphose into frogs eat up their late-blooming tadpole siblings.
Though no frog is big enough to be a man-eater, some of the most beautiful frog species are extremely lethal to mammals, including humans. One of the exhibit’s centerpieces is a large, naturalistic vivarium teeming with deadly poison dart frogs from South America.
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Never much more than an inch-and-a-half long, the various poison-dart species come in delightful colors–vivid reds, greens, blues or blacks. In the Amazon, where they eat insects that carry highly toxic chemicals, the frogs are dangerous to touch, because their skin secretes those deadly substances to drive off predators.
Some Amazonian Indian tribes carefully gather certain species of the frogs to rub tips of darts across their backs. Using blowguns, they hunt animals like monkeys for food with the darts. The poison can kill prey as large as jaguars.
The deadliest species of all is the golden poison frog, present in the exhibit and barely an inch long. A single frog has enough toxicity in it to kill 20,000 mice or 10 humans.
“It’s probably the most poisonous animal on Earth,” said Patricia Ward, the museum’s project director for the frog exhibit.
“Scientists are now very interested in the secretions of the poison dart frogs for possible medicinal applications. In laboratory settings, they show great promise in suppressing HIV infections. As painkillers, they are 200 times more powerful than morphine, but the trick is to reduce the toxicity so they can be used on humans.”
African clawed frogs in the exhibit–strange-looking, pancake-flat creatures–have long been popular lab animals because they are easy to raise and very sensitive to environmental change. Their transparent eggs allow embryologists to watch them progress from a single cell to a tadpole.
“Frogs in general are excellent environmental indicators,” Ward said. “Their skin is so thin, frogs don’t drink water but absorb it through their skin. When pollutants are present, their thin skin is a liability. They are among the first animals to be affected adversely by environmental degradation.”
Environmental scientists in the last 30 years have worried about increasing damage and destruction to frog and other amphibian populations worldwide, an indication of a troubled environment. Nearly a third of all known frog species are considered threatened, and more than 120 amphibian species have become extinct in the last 25 years, according to the Global Amphibian Assessment.
Traveling the country for the last few years, the exhibit is mounted by Clyde Peeling’s Reptiland of Allenwood, Pa. The museum is charging a $5 fee, in addition to its regular admission, to see the frogs.
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If you go
WHAT: “Frogs! A Chorus of Colors,” featuring 150 frogs from 15 countries.
WHERE: Museum of Science and Industry, 57th Street and Lake Shore Drive.
WHEN: Exhibit runs through Jan. 7.
Museum hours through Sept. 4: 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday; 11 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Sunday.
COST: $5 plus general museum admission ($10 for adult Chicago residents, $6.25 for ages 3 to 11 and $8.75 for ages 65 and up. General admission is slightly higher for non-residents).
INFORMATION: www.msichicago.org or call 773-684-1414.
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