DOW backtracks on advice for euthanizing frogs

Don't stick your unwanted frogs in the freezer.

That was the message Friday from the Colorado Division of Wildlife, two days after the agency issued a news release in which an expert said people could euthanize unwanted frogs and reptiles by freezing them instead of releasing them into ponds.

"It might sound cruel, but the best thing to do with unwanted pet frogs, salamanders, baby alligators, goldfish, and the like - is to freeze them," herptile specialist Tina Jackson said in the release. "As they cool down they enter into a hibernation sleep state and then pass away."

Some veterinarians and other people complained after stories ran in newspapers around the state, and the DOW changed its tune Friday.

"The DOW sincerely apologizes for any misinformation and suggesting an inappropriate method of euthanasia," the agency wrote in a second news release.

Officials were trying to show the threat non-native frogs can pose to ponds, creeks and wetlands when people get them as pets and release them.

For example, at Fountain Creek Nature Center, there are no more native leopard frogs because the area has been taken over by non-native bullfrogs, said DOW spokesman Michael Seraphin.

But the freezing suggestion is what got picked up by the Associated Press, and officials learned the American Veterinarian Medical Association does not consider freezing a humane form of euthana- sia.

The first release said people should try to give them away, and then "humanely euthanize" them if nobody wanted them.

"We didn't even need to mention the euthanasia options in the original, but to give people a homeremedy type option," Seraphin said. "What we believed to be an acceptable practice is not what the veterinary community recommended."

Instead, the agency said in the second release, people should return them to where they bought them, give them away or donate them to a local museum, aquarium or zoo.

So what is the veterinarians' preferred method of frog execution? Lethal injection.

But because only veterinarians are allowed to have the right chemicals, definitely don't try that at home.

CONTACT THE WRITER: 476-1605 or scott.rappold@gazette.com