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| Mutated Frogs by: Melissa Timmerman Hard News
The teacher later made several phone calls concerning the matter, which lead her to Judy Helgin of the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. Helgin has since played an active and important role in the research of these frogs. Several water tests were done, and frog embryos were grown in water from both areas where mutated frogs were found as well as areas where there were no mutated frogs. Scientists found that it was, in fact, some chemical in the water that was causing these mutations. "We know that something in the water, including ground water used by humans for drinking water, is extraordinarily potent in malforming frogs." Said George Lucier of the National Institute of environmental Health Scientists. Researchers are now doing more testing on the water, trying to isolate the chemical causing these mutations before it becomes serious enough to affect humans in the same way.So if you happen to notice any frogs with extra legs or missing eyes, don't drink the water, and report it to the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.  |
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In August of 1995, a group of middle school students from the Minnesota New Country School in Le Sueur, Minnesota stumbled upon some malformed frogs. Some of these frogs were missing a leg or had two or three extra legs, while others were missing eyes. The group of students, along with their teacher, was on a hike through the Ney Woods as part of a Nature Studies Class. When they first noticed these frogs, they thought that they may have stepped on them and injured them. It did not take long for them to realize that they were not stepping on the frogs, but that more than just a few of them were deformed. Approximately 50 percent of the frogs they caught that day had some sort of deformity.