Media Information 25 September 2008
Saving NZ’S Native Frogs The Message of This Year’s Freddo Frog Roadshow
In a bid to help raise awareness of New Zealand’s endangered native frogs, Cadbury is kicking off its Freddo Frog
Roadshow this weekend to coincide with Frog Week, which runs from 28 September until 4 October 2008.
The Freddo Frog Roadshow will visit five zoos, sanctuaries and museums around the country over September and October to
raise awareness of New Zealand’s four remaining, protected species of native frog (Archey’s, Hochstetter’s, Hamilton’s
and Maud Island frog.)
In 2008, the International Year of the Frog, Cadbury Freddo is proud to support native frog conservation by helping to
raise awareness of these amphibians, which are completely unique to New Zealand and face extinction.
The Freddo Frog Roadshow will stop at all the main centres, visiting Otago Museum in Dunedin, Karori Sanctuary in
Wellington, Orana Wildlife Park in Christchurch, Hamilton Zoo and finally Auckland Zoo.
The Roadshow is designed to help children learn the importance of frog conservation through fun and interactive
activities including a listening station, touch post, story-teller, games and educational displays, all housed within a
native forest-themed grove. Every visitor to the Freddo Grove will also receive a Freddo Frog educational booklet and
have the chance to meet Freddo.
New Zealand frogs have a number special features that make them unlike any other frogs in the world. They have round
rather than slit eyes, they hatch straight into almost fully-formed frogs instead of tadpoles, and they don’t croak
regularly. They are unique to the New Zealand ecosystem and if they are not protected, could be extinct within our
lifetime.
2008 Year of the Frog spokesperson Ruud “Bugman” Kleinpaste says the Freddo Frog Roadshow is a great place to take the
kids to learn more about our native frogs and what we can do to help.
“For the past four billion years this world has survived everything that was thrown at it: asteroid impacts, severe
cooling, intense heating, you name it and all without a carbon credit in sight. The only thing that helped this planet
survive was a full complement of species: plants, animals, bacteria, fungi... yes, frogs too! We need our biodiversity
to save the planet and we cannot lose any more species to extinction.
“So, let’s look after all we've got and that, of course, includes our special native frogs,” says Kleinpaste.
The Freddo Frog Roadshow aims to educate younger Kiwis that New Zealand’s frogs are a unique part of our natural
heritage and must be protected.
ENDS