California commission votes to protect 2 frogs

The California Fish and Game Commission voted unanimously to designate two species of native frogs inhabiting high-elevation lakes in the Sierra Nevada and Southern California mountain ranges as threatened and endangered species under the state’s Endangered Species Act.

Sierra mountain yellow-legged frogs are now protected as threatened species and Southern mountain yellow-legged frogs are designated as endangered.

“With formal state protection, California can start recovering an important part of mountain ecosystems to bring back formerly abundant amphibians,” Jeff Miller at the Center for Biological Diversity, which petitioned for state protection in 2010, said in a statement. “Taking out exotic trout and getting rid of pollutants to restore mountain yellow-legged frogs will have ripple effects beyond these species — it’ll help to heal some of the damaged high-elevation habitats of the Sierra and Southern California mountains.”

 — Lake Tahoe News staff report