Assessing and monitoring the ecosystem of urban lake parks of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia using amphibian species

Abstract

Frog extinction phenomenon occurs throughout the world. Around 33% of amphibian species threatened while more than 150 species have been extinct since 1980. This is due to the impact of urbanization that exploits habitats for urban wildlife, especially diversity of frogs’ habitant. As animal with limited mobility, frog become the most affected species from this global threat. Although it is often described as an animal that has a bad and ludicrous appearance, frogs have a very important role in the environment. Its thin skin character makes frogs a very common animal to measure the level of environmental pollution. The aim of this research is to determine the amphibian in the urban lake garden in Kuala Lumpur as bio-ecological indicator. As the fastest growing city in Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur has become an area of study. Five lakes parks in lined with urban areas and categorized as a high potential pollution contributor. The studied lake garden is Perdana Botanical Garden, Titiwangsa Lake Garden, Batu Metropolitan Lake Garden, Kepong Metropolitan Lake Garden and Permaisuri Lake Garden. The result shows that Perdana Botanical Garden consists of the highest number of frog species (n=7) and frog population (n=80). Meanwhile, Titiwangsa and Permaisuri Lake Garden recorded the least number of species and population. The best lake garden with the least contamination is Perdana Botanical Garden. Most of the contamination measured score the least value compare to others Parks. Batu and Kepong Metropolitan Lake Garden score the highest value in contamination, especially in copper, nitrite and phosphorus score. The most favorable habitat for frogs are at the Perdana Botanical Garden and Batu Metropolitan Parks. These parks contain a numerous marginal and aquatic plants and less steep edges that suitable for frog’s locomotion. Kepong Metropolitan Park becomes the most unsuitable habitat as it is consist a lot of steep edges and less suitable flora near the pond. As a summary, the result shows that mixed up findings that can lead to multiple conclusions. This result due to the characteristics of the parks that influence their suitability as frog habitat. Flora and lake edges are some example of driving factors categorize as lake character that influence frog habitat. From the observation made, most species recorded from the parks were common species found in urban area, which also considered as indicator of the adverse effects of urbanization on the ecology. In a nutshell, frog population is influenced by water quality of a park. It is vital to have a suitable habitat that address frog needs to cater their population in a lake park. Thus, the study come with a suggestions that allocation for some portion of natural habitat, whether existing natural or designed natural habitat is necessary for frog to perform its function as biological indicators for a healthy urban environment.