On May 19th, 2020, we spoke with Mark Mandica, Co-Founder and Executive Director of the Amphibian Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to the study and conservation of amphibians.

His work puts him on the front line in the effort to conserve declining native and tropical amphibians. He received his B.S. from UMass where his thesis focused on the ephemeral wetland ecology of amphibians. He then went on to the American Museum of Natural History in NY, where he worked as a Curatorial Assistant before moving to South Florida for graduate school at University of Miami. Mark’s M.Sc. explored the amphibian community ecology in the Everglades as well as photoreception related activity patterns in South Florida bufonids.

Mark is also a professional scientific illustrator and is published in textbooks as well as the journals Science, Nature, Journal of Experimental Biology, Zoology, American Zoologist and many others. Originally, Mark’s academic interests were broadly based on the form, function and evolution of amphibians, with particular interest in the biomechanics of feeding: prey detection, capture and transport. During the course of his studies however, it became increasingly difficult to simply find amphibians outdoors, and as a result, he has joined fellow scientists and naturalists to address the global amphibian decline crisis.

Before founding the Amphibian Foundation in 2016, he managed the amphibian conservation program at the Atlanta Botanical Garden. Mark has now dedicated the majority of his time towards conservation efforts aimed at reversing amphibian declines in the southeast US and abroad, and teaching amphibian biology, ecology and conservation at Agnes Scott College in Decatur, GA.