When I saw the photo, I thought surely this must be the smallest frog in the world?

Au contraire – it’s only the smallest species discovered in the OLD world .

They’ve found even smaller ones in Brazil and Cuba, though there seems to be some confusion over whether the Brazilian Gold Frog (Brachycephalus didactylus) or Cuba’s Monte Iberia Eleuth (Eleutherodactylus iberia) is the smallest.

Here are pictures of them both, anyhow:

The researchers are out in Borneo searching for the world’s lost amphibians as part of a campaign organized by Conservation International and IUCN’s Amphibians Specialist Group.

It’s worth checking out CI’s Search For the Lost Frogs page if you have a minute….

There’s a special photo group set up on Flickr for you to upload your own frog photos, and I’ve just uploaded a pic I took in Le Perinet rainforest in Madagascar…maybe someone will identify it for me!

The massive expansion of tourism over the last 40 years has led to the rapid decline in the quality of the reef.

Coral everywhere faces the threat of bleaching because water is getting warmer because of climate change. But in highly-developed Cancun, pollution by sewage and chemicals and overfishing mean the coral in this region is dying faster than anywhere else.

The Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network says the amount of reef surface covered by live coral in the Caribbean has fallen about 80% in the past 30 years. In the Pacific, between Hawaii and Indonesia, meanwhile, reefs have been losing about 1% of their coral coverage annually over the past 25 years. eTurboNews spoke to Cancun dive instructors who said they were worried they might not have a job for much longer.

Cancun knew it needed to address the problem, but the country desperately needs its tourist dollars, and Cancun couldn’t turn divers and snorkellers away.

By building the underwater museum – which in effect becomes an artificial reef – there is something new for divers and snorkellers to explore, and the existing coral reef is given chance to recover from years of damage. I doubt it’ll ever get back to its original condition but coral will colonise the inert concrete of the sculptures, creating new coral coverage.

I must admit, the thought of an ‘underwater museum’ didn’t really float my boat at first – I dive to see wildlife, not for cultural enrichment.

But when I checked out the website of Jason de Caires Taylor, the British artist behind the project, I really warmed to the  idea.

‘Museum’ is a bit misleading – it will be more of a sculpture garden, with more than 300 life-size sculptures, such as an army of Mayan warriors, and a ‘dream catcher’ where visitors can leave a message in a bottle. I recognised the photos of his existing project – Taylor built the Underwater Gallery at Moliniere Bay in Grenada.

His description of what it’s like to experience artwork underwater sounds fantastic:

“Underwater and devoid of white walls the viewer is unrestrained in their interaction with the work. Buoyancy and weightlessness enable a detached physical experience, encouraging encounters that are perceptual and personal. As time passes and the works change, they reshape and redefine the underwater landscape in unpredictable ways.”

And the sculptures that have been submerged for some time, now covered in coral polyps and other growth, are really stunning.

Sinking a load of concrete statues is not going to solve the massive and complex threats that coral reefs around the world face but the Underwater Museum does seem like an exciting and innovative step in the right direction.

I’m not usually that into gardens (see other blog posts for attempts to cultivate a herb garden on my balcony) but this one was lovely. I surprised myself with how many plants and flowers I could name – I’ve obviously absorbed some horticultural knowledge from my parents by osmosis over the years.

Sadly, an increasing appreciation of horticulture has not been matched by an increased ability to care for stuff. This is the current state of my balcony garden. Dead as a doornail.

Back to Homebase next weekend for me then…..

At about two metres square, it’s unlikely I’ll ever grow enough out there to become self-sufficient, but you’ve got to start somewhere.

I had intended to fully research balcony gardening before I went, to find out who likes sharing a pot with who, which plants I should be planting at this time of year, and which plants are most likely to thrive on the 37 minutes of morning sunshine our balcony currently enjoys.

Instead, I rocked up at Homebase with only a very vague idea of what I was going to buy, and quickly fell out with the store assistant: “Look, I just water the plants. I don’t know anything about plants” was the unhelpful response I got when I asked which type of mint she’d recommend.

I ended up struggling home on the bus with: two 70cm plastic planter troughs; a bag of compost; a pot each of mint, basil and coriander; and a ‘Pick-a-Pep’ plant which already has five miniature red peppers growing on it.

Coriander (left) and mint.

I have no doubt that sturdier, healthier, and more ethically-sourced plants are available from other outlets. At Homebase on a sunny Sunday afternoon, it was more a case of trying to find any plant which still had its label on. But now they’re bedded in and watered they’re not looking too ropey, are they?