frogs | Te Papa’s Blog

Kiore, Whit! The Collected Archives of Tony Whitaker

Humanities Technician Cassandra Bahr has been working in the Collected Archives at Te Papa, cataloguing and rehousing papers from people connected to Te Papa’s collecting areas. Here, she discusses the archive of Tony Whitaker, a renowned herpetologist who donated his collection of specimens to Te Papa. For an introduction to Tony Whitaker, read Anthony Hume Whitaker, MNZM (1944–2014) – a tribute, and to understand more of the importance of his work, see A gift of lizards – 35 years to completion.Read more

By: Cassandra Bahr

On: 14 Oct 2025

In: Behind the scenes, Science

Aotearoa New Zealand’s endemic frogs and their American cousin

Between November 2022 and February 2023, Te Papa Natural History interns Tobia Dale and Ben Carson assisted with the curation of three major donations of Aotearoa New Zealand pepeketua and mokomoko. In this fourth and final blog about their work, they highlight some very special frogs that they were privilegedRead more

By: Ben Carson and Tobia Dale

On: 7 Jun 2023

In: Science

Searching for New Zealand’s first record of chytrid fungus in frogs

Between November 2022 and February 2023, Te Papa Natural History interns Tobia Dale and Ben Carson assisted with the curation of three major donations of New Zealand frogs and lizards. In this third blog about their work, Tobia describes her attempt to track down the first evidence of a deadly fungus in Aotearoa New Zealand.Read more

By: Tobia Dale

On: 1 Jun 2023

In: Science

Processing pickled pepeketua – how many frogs can you fit in a jar?

How do museum curators decide what specimens to keep, or to give to the beetles to be reduced to bones, or dispose of? As Natural History summer interns, Ben Carson and Tobia Dale, were tasked with the job of processing three recently acquired research collections from prominent herpetologists Ben Bell, Ruth Ainsworth, and Phil Bishop.Read more

By: Ben Carson and Tobia Dale

On: 27 Feb 2023

In: Science

Looking at a larger species of frog, Photographer: Amanda Rodgers, © Te Papa

Scientists meet Scientists: ECE ‘Back of House’ visits (Group 2: Kiwi Kids ECE)

Throughout 2015, young children from three Wellington regional Early Childhood Centres (ECE) have been thinking and working as scientists as part of the ‘It’s a Bugs Life’ partnership project with Te Papa Education. In celebration of the mahi (work), their teachers and educators from Te Papa arranged for the children to come and meet with more experienced scientistsRead more

By: Rebecca Browne

On: 9 Nov 2015

In: Behind the scenes, Education, Science

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