Frogs legs

[animalluver]

I have just lerned that the FRENCH cut the backlegs of live frogs and then leve them in agony becose they will grow new pairs of legs, wich can then be cut of agen! This cant be rite can it? We shud boycot them now.

[bernardo]

That's rubbish. Frogs do not grow their legs back like that.

[SteveD]

In fact, I think that the frogs are bred in the far east and the legs are exported to France (and to other countries). Unfortunately, I think that it is extremely unlikely that the legs are removed humanely. Consquently, if this upsets you, do not eat frogs' legs. Were you proposing boycotting the French or boycotting restaurants which serve frogs' legs? Boycotting the France or the French would be as pointless as referring to "French Fries" as "Freedom Fries". "French" fries have nothing to do with France.

[New Forester]

I have seen film of legs being cut off live frogs, so that part is true, at least. It was being done in Asia, I think for export to Europe. The frogs were caught from the wild, and I know this leads to pest problems in the paddy fields. In fact, some amphibians (particularly newts) can regrow limbs -- but unfortunately not those frogs. The frogs were being cut above the "hips", so they lost the whole of the legs and presumably part of the pelvis. There is no doubt that they die, although they may survive for a few days. Re-growing of limbs in amphibians only happens, I think, when a good bit of the limb is still present. It even happens a little in humans -- if a very young baby loses the tip of a finger below the last joint, it often regrows without any scar or missing bits (fingerprints and nails and all). Other injuries often don't scar in young children either. Apparently, the loss of re-growing in adult mammals is to do with the need for a warm-blooded animal to heal very fast, so scarring is favoured over re-growing. Recent research is looking into ways of suppressing scarring in the hope of persuading human limbs to regrow.

[New Forester]

(continued)... Laboratory mice are routinely marked by punching tiny holes in their ears. One researcher found his mice's ears healing up, and thus discovered a non-scarring strain of mouse, and it can actually regrow bits of its limbs too. As far as the frogs are concerned, although cutting them up is barbaric in the extreme, it may be that frogs do not experience pain in the way we do. I've seen toads just after being squashed on the road, with the back half missing. The front half was still walking along as if nothing much had happened, apparently not too bothered. I'm not at all sure though if even a complete absence of pain and distress would justify that barbarism -- and how can be be sure that an apparent lack of distress in an animal is real? It's easy to be critical of other cultural values, or lack of them -- but I know several otherwise-lovely British people who think nothing of cutting slugs in half. That's OK, apparently, as "they are horrible". It's their death, not themselves, which is horrible -- and slug pellets aren't much better. Take them in a bucket to the common where they'll be happy. Incidentally, bisected earthworms do not grow into two either -- the front half just grows a new tail. Flatworms do grow into two (or more) though.