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Roles of Rice Paddies and Neighboring Biotopes with Different Hydroperiods in Providing Habitat for an Endangered Pond Frog Population in Japan

  • Wetland Conservation and Restoration
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Abstract

The Nagoya Daruma pond frog Pelophylax porosus brevipodus (formerly Rana porosa brevipoda) requires a wet environment year-round, but such habitats have generally been lost due to improved rice paddy drainage such that the frog populations have been decreasing. There have been attempts to create permanent pools in rice paddy areas to help the populations recover, but the basic life history patterns and population dynamics in both environments have not been well studied. We captured frogs in rice paddies and adjacent biotopes. Using capture–mark–recapture data with 816 marked individuals, we compared frog demographics and population structure using a Jolly–Seber POPAN model. Constructed biotopes had conditions favoring long-term persistence. For example, biotopes had larger frogs of both sexes than rice paddies. The ratio of juveniles to adults was lower in biotopes than rice paddies. By contrast, rice paddies were an important habitat for breeding and producing new frogs. The two habitats complemented each other to support the local frog population. Because P. p. brevipodus is now exclusively distributed in rice paddy areas, the creation of permanent pools is a feasible way to improve habitat quality, especially in modernized rice paddy areas with few permanent lentic habitats.

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Data Availability

The datasets during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

We thank colleagues for help collecting data in the field. The 2011 surveys were partially supported by NPO Earth Watch Japan and its volunteer members. We are grateful for Mr. K. Uehara, Mr. K. Otsuka, Dr. K. Fukamachi and Dr. Y. Mukai for supporting the surveys with volunteer members and also an associate editor and anonymous reviewer for the improvements of the manuscript. We appreciated Incorporated Administrative Agency Japan, Biwa Development Integrated Operation and Maintenance Office and Natural Environment Conservation Division of Shiga Prefecture for permitting our research.

Funding

This work was supported by a Global Environment Research Fund (F-094) of the Ministry of the Environment, Japan.

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Author notes

  1. Risa S. Naito and Masaru Sakai contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Human Sciences, Waseda University, 2-579-15 Mikajima, Tokorozawa, Saitama, 359-1192, Japan

    Risa S. Naito

  2. Fukushima Regional Collaborating Research Center, National Institute for Environmental Studies, 10-2 Fukasaku, Miharu, Tamura District, Fukushima, 963-7700, Japan

    Masaru Sakai

  3. Graduate School of Environmental Studies, Nagoya University, Furo-cho, Chikusa-ku, Nagoya-city, Aichi, 464-8601, Japan

    Yosihiro Natuhara

  4. Graduate School of Global Environmental Studies, Kyoto University, Yoshida-honmachi, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto, 606-8501, Japan

    Yukihiro Morimoto

Authors
  1. Risa S. Naito
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  4. Yukihiro Morimoto
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by R.S.N. and M.S. The first draft of the manuscript was written by R.S.N. and M.S., and Y.N. and Y.M. commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Risa S. Naito or Masaru Sakai.

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Naito, R.S., Sakai, M., Natuhara, Y. et al. Roles of Rice Paddies and Neighboring Biotopes with Different Hydroperiods in Providing Habitat for an Endangered Pond Frog Population in Japan. Wetlands 44, 21 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-024-01781-z

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