ABSTRACT
For many years, amphibians were understudied in the ecotoxicological literature. In 1989, the Canadian Wildlife Service published a comprehensive review of studies examining the effects of contaminants on amphibians (Power et al. 1989). Just 10 years later, the same organization published an updated review that included twice the number of studies (Pauli et al. 2000), indicating rapid growth in the field of amphibian ecotoxicology. However, Sparling et al. (2000) point out that the number of amphibian ecotoxicological studies remains modest relative to research utilizing other taxa. Relyea and Hoverman (2006) also report that amphibian data appear to be lagging behind other taxa, despite an increasing number of ecotoxicological studies involving freshwater ecosystems in general.
