Making it happen
This is what coordinated conservation delivers
Triprion spinosus · Photo: Brian Gratwicke
2025–2026, together with our partners
Source: ASA 2025–2026 Annual Report
Collaboration
Stronger together
Amphibians do not recognize borders. Neither can conservation. In 2025–26, we helped turn plans into action across continents.
Policy that comes with funding
Panama's National Key Biodiversity Area Assessment
How a first conversation became a funded national process.
1,631 amphibian species qualify as KBA trigger species, more than any other group except plants and birds.
Building capacity since 2023
Groundwork from 2024–25
Conservation planning
Two Conservation Planning Workshops developed coordinated recovery strategies: a genus-wide Telmatobius workshop held in Santiago, Chile, and a Colombian Atelopus workshop held in Cali, Colombia. ASA funded early-career conservationists to participate through the Future Leaders program.
- Telmatobius · Convened by: IUCN SSC ASG Telmatobius Task Force, Amphibian Red List Authority, and Amphibian Ark
- Atelopus · Convened by: Amphibian Ark, Atelopus Survival Initiative, ASG-Colombia, ARLA, and ReCRAC
- Facilitated by: IUCN SSC Conservation Planning Specialist Group
Two of the most threatened genera on Earth, now with roadmaps for recovery
Biobanking network
The first Latin American Biobanking Workshop established a regional network for cryopreservation, assisted reproductive technologies, and genetic resource management. ASA co-supported the workshop and coordinated partner participation. Through TARI, partners contribute results to the network, including genetic material from 20 species held in regional biobanks.
- Workshop led by: Cali Zoo
- Participating partners: FUDECI, Centro Jambatu, and Parque Explora
A regional safety net for populations in crisis
Conservation Tools series
The four-part Amphibian Conservation Tools series introduced the community to the IUCN Red List, Green Status, Conservation Needs Assessments, and Conservation Planning. Designed for accessibility and requiring no prior expertise, the series gave partners practical guidance for applying these tools in evidence-based conservation programs.
- In collaboration with: IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group and Red List Authority; IUCN SSC Green Status of Species; Amphibian Ark; IUCN SSC Conservation Planning Specialist Group; and Re:wild
Building a pipeline of conservation planning expertise across the network
IUCN Motion 075
"Urgent scaling up of investment in amphibian conservation needed to prevent further extinctions." Co-led by ASA at the IUCN World Conservation Congress 2025. The global community has spoken.
Disease Preparedness
Ready before the next outbreak
When the next amphibian disease emergency emerges, the response can't start from scratch. Disease Watch is ASA's early-warning infrastructure: a citizen science platform that connects field reports with expert networks, so signals get flagged before they become crises.
Behind the scenes, the work is already underway. This is the infrastructure that makes it count.
Tropical Amphibian Resilience Initiative
$2 million. Five years. The first coordinated international effort to halt amphibian extinctions in the Neotropics.
Jorge Guerrel monitoring crowned treefrogs in Panama · Photo: Brian Gratwicke
Co-led by the Amphibian Survival Alliance and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, this Bezos Earth Fund-supported initiative unites partners across four Latin American countries to combat the chytrid fungus crisis and secure a future for amphibians in the region that harbors 48% of the world's amphibian biodiversity.
Partners include Centro Jambatu de Investigación y Conservación de Anfibios (Ecuador), FUDECI (Venezuela), Parque Explora (Colombia), and the Panama Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project. Together, we're developing techniques to recover populations impacted by fungal diseases, rewilding native frogs raised in captivity, and protecting critical habitats.
"For the first time, we are launching a coordinated international effort to halt amphibian extinctions in the Neotropics. It's a powerful testament to what collaboration can achieve for endangered species.
Two years in
Released
24 release events involving eight species
4 countries
Survived
Lemur leaf frogs reached adulthood; Atelopus still recorded a year on
Panama · Ecuador
Signs of breeding
Atelopus cruciger surviving like stable wild populations, with signs of egg-laying
Venezuela
Born wild
Wild-born Pratt's rocket frog juveniles, a year after translocation
Panama
First evidence of establishment
Born wild.
More than a year after Pratt's rocket frogs were returned to the forest in Panama, partners found juveniles that had hatched in the wild: the first sign that a released population is taking hold.
Juvenile Pratt's rocket frog, Panama · Photo: Nate Weisenbeck
The Alliance
One frog, one partner
From 69 partner organizations in 2023 to 92 today, working across 38 countries and all six biogeographic realms.
92 partner organizations: 69 in 2023, 20 joined since, and 3 joined this year.
Welcome, Museums Victoria Research Institute, Fundación Zoológica de Cali and Fundación Los Naturalistas
Featured Project
In Ecuador's cloud forests, a team found more than they were looking for
Atelopus colomai, one of three harlequin toad species documented · Photo: Juan Pablo Reyes Puig EcoMinga/FOER
Six months of night surveys through Ecuador's rainiest landscapes. 130 harlequin toads documented, including 77 Atelopus colomai. Then the genetic results came back: one of the populations wasn't just rare. It was likely an entirely new species.
Funded through ASA's Targeted Amphibian Research and Action Program (TARAP), this project was led by Juan Pablo Reyes Puig in collaboration with EcoMinga, Oscar Efrén Reyes Foundations, and Finca La Argentina, with support from Universidad San Francisco de Quito, Instituto Nacional de Biodiversidad, Trier University, and Universidad Estatal Amazónica. Together with nine researchers and five biology students, the team established the first population baselines for three harlequin toad species in the upper Pastaza watershed, and discovered a new population of the Critically Endangered Atelopus palmatus near cleared pastureland, proof that hope persists even at the edge of human impact.
The sites are now protected. The monitoring protocols are published. And a new generation of Ecuadorian researchers is ready to continue the work.
"The discovery of new populations and a likely new species gives us hope, but it also shows how much remains unknown about these critically threatened frogs.
Featured Project
In Nepal's highlands, a young researcher counted what no one had measured before
Conducting household surveys to document hunting practices in Dhorpatan Hunting Reserve · Photo: Prabal Birjung Rana
Eighteen months of fieldwork across Himalayan streams, grasslands, and villages. Fifty households interviewed. And a number that changed everything: 32,000 stream frogs harvested every year in just two villages.
Funded through the Amphibian Survival Alliance's Future Leaders of Amphibian Conservation program, Suman Sapkota and his team at Friends of Nature Nepal established the first scientific baseline on amphibian hunting in Dhorpatan Hunting Reserve. They documented 10 species across 16 survey sites, including two new records for the area. More critically, they quantified a threat that had never been measured: intensive seasonal harvesting of Nanorana liebigii, with 91% of captures targeting large individuals during breeding season.
The findings are now in the hands of reserve officials and local government. Three community members were trained to continue monitoring. And Suman? He now leads his organization's herpetofauna program.
"This project strengthened my confidence and deepened my commitment to amphibian research. The recognition earned me the opportunity to lead the herpetofauna wing at my organization.
The work continues
Read the full story in our 2025–2026 Annual Report
Download Annual ReportPast reports: 2024–2025 Annual Report