A new exhibit at Brookfield Zoo working to conserve the nearly extinct Panamanian golden frog—the national animal of Panama—is dedicated to the memory of Stacy Blundell, the Naperville teen killed by a drunk driver in 2011, in recognition of her passion for amphibians, the Chicago Tribune reports.
According to the paper, Blundell worked at a pet store and spent much of her salary on filling her personal terrariums with the frogs and toads she loved; now, underneath an exhibit meant to preserve one of the world’s rarest, rests a plaque saying “In Loving Memory of Frog Enthusiast Stacey Blundell,” and “SB” is carved into a rock in the display.
"This really has been my bright spot," Blundell’s father Phil told the paper, of the exhibit, which he proposed to the zoo, a place Stacey also loved. "A lot of the other things for her were great, but this is the one thing I thought that Stacey would really enjoy and that we would be able to enjoy with her had she still been here."
"It's such an important conservation project that the Association of Zoos and Aquariums and Brookfield are doing," Jeff Mitchell, associate curator of aquatics and reptiles for the Chicago Zoological Society, added to the paper.