LIHUE — The capture of a single coqui frog on Kauai will result in months of routine monitoring for more of the loud, invasive pests.
It was around 8:30 p.m. on July 1 when Pam Brown and her boyfriend Lincoln Gill heard a distinctive sound outside their home in Wailua Homesteads. It was one they remembered from a recent trip to Hilo, on the Big Island.
Coquis have a distinct mating call — a two-note, high-pitched “ko-kee” sound.
“It’s kind of a sweet little sound,” Brown said.
However, Brown recalls her trip to Hilo over Memorial Day, and the deafening “wall of sound” that starts before dusk and goes until dawn.
“You can hear the frogs through rolled up car windows as you’re driving by,” Brown said. “That’s the last thing we want Kauai to become.”
Brown and Gill tracked the call to a shrub in front of a house two doors down from their own, but were unable to locate the critter. They called KISC to report it and a field crew visited the area later that night but did not hear anything, according to Brown.
The next night, Ray Kahaunaele, KISC’s field operations supervisor, met Brown at 8:30 p.m. at the same location. This time, the frog was calling, but Brown said Kahaunaele could not pinpoint where it was hiding in a tree.
On the third night, four KISC field crew members came out and scoured the area with ladders and flashlights until the frog was spotted, according to Brown.
Outreach Specialist Tiffany Keanini confirmed that KISC assisted the Hawaii Department of Agriculture in capturing one juvenile male coqui last Thursday. And with a possibility that there could be more, KISC will continue monitoring the area periodically for the next eight months, she said.
How does KISC do that?
“We go out and listen,” Keanini said with a laugh.
But it’s not a laughing matter. There’s a reason the coqui is on KISC’s list of priority species.
Native to Puerto Rico, the small, nocturnal frogs were accidentally introduced to Hawaii hidden in plants around or before 1988, according to the KISC website. The quarter-sized frogs have no natural predators, eat “huge quantities of insects” leading to loss of pollination, and produce a “loud, incessant and annoying call from dusk until dawn.”
On Kauai, a breeding population of coqui covering about 10 acres was discovered in Lawai in 2001. After extensive efforts, Lawai was declared coqui-free in June 2012, according to KISC.
In comparison, the damage has already been done on Big Island, where it is estimated that coqui frogs infest 60,000 acres.
Brown, who lives on Leinomi Street, said she has sent out emails to make sure everyone in her neighborhood is aware of the situation.
“Of course, if we hear anything we’ll certainly let them know,” she said.
Keanini said KISC asks the public to always keep an eye — and ear — out for suspected coqui frogs and other invasive species. Reports should be made to KISC at 821-1490 or the state Pest Hotline at 634-7378.
In May, KISC responded to a call from an unidentified Kauai nursery, where it was able to locate and capture three coqui frogs.
