UV Lighting

[StephenLS]

So, Yesterday courtesy of my thoughtful girlfriend I spent the day with the herp department at quite a large English Zoo.

In addition to seeing a lot of endangered animals close up I also got to tour behind the scenes, quarantine and conservation projects.

As you would expect I spent a lot of time in the Amphibian breeding room and found that they follow the procedure of placing all their frogs/toads under a relatively intense UV Spot light rig for 20 minutes per week. I was dubious when told they seemed to love it but after seeing the process in action I would definately agree with this. Instead of shying away or being jumpy as I expected the animals seemed calm and actually moved towards the light!
They advised that they notice an increase in fertility as a result of this!
This process was carefully monitored in regard to distance from the animals and UV output.

Does anybody else do this?

[Mcbobs]

Hmmm.... I wonder why they do that. What zoo was this?

[John]

This isn't the first such anecdote I've heard. However, I'm firmly in the camp that believes these anecdotes are meaningless until someone publishes some research. In the case of the zoo you visited, they could carry out a study themselves for relatively little cost, since they have the equipment set up already.

[Socrates]

UV lighting is a form of radiation (very low) but still strong enough to kill microbes. Thus, it could make plausible sense for the frogs to naturally be drawn to the light, plus the increase in fertility could correlate with healthier adults. I should add that UV can also damage parasites and fungi that could be inhabiting an amphibians epidermal layer. Many amphibians have beneficial peptide compounds that lysis foreign invaders on their ectoderm. The brief 20 minute period of UV exposure then would be similar to what we humans do when we radiate food. Which is hitting the food with charged elements that acts as an antimirobial, fungicide and antiparasite. Sorry for the nerdism haha, Pre-Vet student with a minor in Chemistry and Physiology, can't help it :-).