New family of amphibianas found in NE

Indian researchers have discovered a new family of legless amphibians commonly known as Caecilians (one of the three groups of Amphibia) in north-eastern India and parts of Myanmar and Thailand. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Feb 23, 2012, 12:26:50 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Indian researchers have discovered a new family of legless amphibians — commonly known as caecilians that superficially resemble earthworms or snakes — in India’s northeast and parts of Myanmar and Thailand.

The discovery of the family, called Chikilidae, was part of a study conducted by SD Biju of the University of Delhi along with co-researchers from the Natural History Museum, London, and Vrije University, Brussels. Interestingly, in 2003, Biju was responsible for the discovery of another family of amphibians — the purple frog. That was a discovery in the class of amphibians that had come after a gap of 100 years.

"This new family has ancient links to Africa," read the study reported in Proceedings of Royal Society of London on Tuesday. It is believed that the family separated from other species of caecilians more than 140 million years ago at the break-up of the southern continents (Gondwana). Their DNA was tested to reach this conclusion.

The new species is threatened by the rapidly disappearing green cover in the northeast. Immediate steps are required to protect the remaining forests from human activities like Jhum cultivation, the study said. Globally, amphibians are the most threatened vertebrate group with one out of three surviving amphibian species on the verge of extinction.

“Apart from habitat destruction, local myth also contributes to caecilian depletion. Local communities believe that caecilians are venomous ‘snakes’. Actually, caecilians are neither venomous nor are they snakes. They never bite. They open their mouths only to eat,” Biju said. The researcher said the discovery was the result of unprecedented fieldwork comprising soil-digging surveys in about 250 localities spread over all states of the northeast. The work was carried out over five years from 2006 to 2010. “The work is the most extensive systematic programme of dedicated caecilian surveys ever attempted,” Biju said.

The Chikilidae lead a secretive life under soil, making it challenging to find them. They can normally be seen on rainy days.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More