Category: amphibians

Saving Ecudadorian land for wildlife (including my frog)

August 1, 2025 • 9:25 am

Reader Lou Jost, a naturalist and evolutionist who works at the Dracula Reserve of Ecuador’s EcoMinga Foundation, just sent me this Facebook post put out by an Ecuadorian province a few years ago. It features MY frog, Atelopus coynei (it’s got a Wikipedia page, too), so it’s a bit self-aggrandizing of me to post this, but in fact the species is critically endangered and I want it saved.  There are surely other undescribed and endangered species on the property (here’s a new tree frog discovered and described by the tem on the reserve.)

The story of the frog, how it got my name, and how it seemed to have gone extinct, but, Lazarus-like, was discovered by Andreas Kay decades later in Chinambi, Carchi, Ecuador, can be seen here.

Isn’t it a beaut? I suspect that its colors indicate that the frog is aposematic, i.e., toxic or dangerous to eat or touch. (The photo is by the late Andreas Kay courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.)

Click photo below go to the FB post:

Lou adds this:

The province is proud to be the only place in the world where your frog survives. It is one of the fruits of our work trying to raise awareness for the rare species of our reserves.

Our  president, Noboa, is firing massive numbers of public employees from ministries he doesn’t like, and closing or re-organizing them so he can do what he wants. Last week he placed the ministry of the environment into the ministry of energy and mining, and this is expected to make it harder for us to fight our main threat in the Dracula Reserve, mining.

There is at least one population of A. coynei outside our reserves. It was the first one that Andreas Kay found. We tried to buy it but the property was apparently involved in drug trafficking and arms dealing, and this scared us too much to deal with it. Maybe someday we or others will be able to protect this population too. We also continue to search for more populations using eDNA. Meanwhile we are monitoring our own populations and they are doing well. Each individual can be identified by their back pattern, so we can keep track of many of them.

If you want to donate to the reserve to save not only the frog, but tons of rainforest wildlife, Lou gave me this information:

Thanks Jerry, the Orchid Conservation Alliance is a US charity that can accept donations for us, and give tax credit for the donations. Donors should specify that their support goes to EcoMinga’s Dracula Reserve (which protects your frog)

I hope some readers can cough up a few bucks for the Reserve!  Any amount will help.

photo by Juan Pablo Reyes and Jordy Salazar/EcoMinga

Readers’ wildlife photos

April 11, 2025 • 8:15 am

Today Mark Sturtevant has returned with pictures of diverse critters, including insects, amphibians, and gastropods. Mark’s IDs, links, and narrative are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

Here are more pictures of various critters in my area, which is in eastern Michigan.

The first picture is a young treefrog, and it is about as big as your thumbnail. This will be one of two sister species in the area, either Cope’s Gray Treefrog, Dryophytes chrysoscelis, or the Gray Treefrog, D. versicolor. They are commonly green in green surroundings. If it is the latter species, then it is tetraploid and that is why it is a separate species from the former. Polyploidy is one way to quickly form a new species, and this is a classic example.

Next up are a couple of our local snails, the Brown-lipped snails, Cepaea nemoralis. I was not sure what to do with them, and so I did this. These snails were introduced from Europe, and are now widespread in the U.S.

The next several pictures are manual focus stacks that were staged on the ‘ol dining room table. First up is a young Flower Crab Spider. That name applies to many species of crab spiders that often lurk on flowers to capture prey. Based on its eye arrangement and prominent hairs, I am pretty sure this one is Mecaphasa sp.

The jumping spiders that follow are species that I’ve shown here many times. The first is a Dimorphic Jumping Spider, Maevia inclemens. This one was very fidgety and it needed something to eat to help settle down. The lights in the eyes of the first picture came from an LED modeling light to help me to focus. I liked the look and so I did not remove the highlighting in post-processing. In the second picture you can see reflections of my fingertips in the large frontal eyes.

Another common spider is the Bold Jumping Spider, Phidippus audax. This youngster was very easy to work with.

The weird creature shown in the next picture is one of our Harvestmen, I think Phalangium opilio. I don’t see this species very often even though it’s distributed all around me. I like them because males have really long pedipalps and horned chelicerae. In some populations, the chelicerae horns are much longer than what is seen here.

Next is a moth that flew inside the house one evening. I think it’s a new species for me – the Lunate Zale Moth, Zale lunata.

And finally, I spotted this large caterpillar one day when out with the cameras. This is a mature Polyphemus Moth larva, Antheraea polyphemus, and it will become maybe the 2nd or 3rd largest moth in the U.S. For the portrait picture, I was trying to get it to look all haughty and Offended, as caterpillars like this often look very offended when being handled. But instead, this one looked like it was Eevil and plotting something, Mwa ha ha haa.

Readers’ wildlife photos

April 7, 2025 • 9:00 am

Don’t forget to send ’em if you got ’em. Thanks!

These are additional photos from reader Loretta Michaels trip to the tropics (part 1 is here).  Her IDs and identifications (the binomials are from me) are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them. Some of the IDs weren’t supplied, so readers are welcome to try their hand.  From Loretta:

These were taken in Oct/Nov 2024 on the Upper Amazon in Peru, as part of a boat trip around the region. If you wanted to add this to my description, I use a Sony DSC-RX10 M4 (a fantastic camera that for some reason Sony has discontinued, much to the disappointment of fans.)

Osprey (Pandion haliaetus):

Amazon Green Kingfisher:

Amazon Kingfisher (Chloroceryle amazona):

Sloth:

Horned Screamer (Anhima cornuta):

Unidentified  butterflies:

Juvenile caiman:

Neotropic cormorant (Nannopterum brasilianum) on left, not sure on right:

Blue-and-Yellow Macaw (Ara ararauna) :

Three more: The first one is a rare hybrid of a white-fronted capuchin and a red uakari (Cacajao sp.); when we visited a village, an old lady was caring for this juvenile, and said it had just shown up one day.  Our guide was amazed, he’d never seen one.  The other two are poison dart frogs:

Readers’ wildlife photos

February 8, 2025 • 8:15 am

Today we have photos of amphibians and other items from Matt Moran, an ecologist at Monteverde in Costa Rica as well as Professor Emeritus in the Department of Biology and Health Sciences at Hendrix College, Conway, Arkansas.  Matt’s captions are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them.

These are photos from the Children’s Eternal Rainforest in Costa Rica (25,000 hectares), where I work as a field biologist. I am engaged in several projects, but my major one is a study on the status of amphibians in the park. Amphibians around the world have been declining and this area of Costa Rica is one of first places it was documented. While many theories have been developed as to why amphibians are declining, the one with the most support that explains the sometimes sudden collapse of amphibian populations (especially frogs) is the arrival of a pathogenic fungus (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis), commonly called chytrid. This fungus infects the skin of frogs and often causes high levels of mortality. It has been implicated in the extinction of dozens of species of frogs around the world.

In the Monteverde area where I work, the population collapses occurred in the late 1980s. Initially, 25 of the known 50 species from the area were missing, but over time, most reappeared, apparently surviving in small numbers and then recolonizing larger areas. It appears that this was a major selection event, so that individuals with natural resistance to the fungus survived to reproduce, while most died. It is estimated that in many species, over 99% of individuals died. About 5 species originally found in the area appear to be totally extinct. Others still missing from here exist elsewhere, although often at critically low levels. Many, however, have recovered and probably exist at levels similar to pre-fungus invasion times.

I am attempting to determine the frog community structure 35 years post-chytrid invasion. These data will be valuable in two ways: 1) to determine how the community structure has changed over the last 35 years, and 2) to determine how future community structure is different from today so that we will have long-term population trends (using now as a baseline).

This is an amazing place to work. I retired from academia several years ago and this has become my new passion. It is one of the most biodiverse protected areas on the planet and every minute I spend in the forest is enchanting beyond description.

Emerald Glass Frog (Espadarana prosoplebon). This is the most common glass frog (Family Centrolenidae) found in this area. As their name suggests, they have transparent skin on the ventral side and their internal organs are easily visible. Interestingly, this species, like most glass frogs, does not appear to have declined because of chytrid fungus invasion. Like all glass frogs, this one breeds in streams:

Reticulated Glass Frog (Hyalinobatrachium valerioi). A fairly common species in mid-elevation areas of rainforest. It is easily identified by the large yellow spots on the dorsal side:

Clay-colored Rain Frog (Pristimantis cerasinus). A small frog found perched on leaves in the rainforest. It is identified by its eye color, often called “sunset” eyes, with the contrasting yellow (dorsal) and brown (ventral) parts of the iris. It has direct development where eggs are laid on the forest floor and the tadpole develops inside the egg directly into a miniature version of the adult. This species declined with the arrival of chytrid fungus but now appears to be relatively common again:

Sunset over the Children’s Eternal Rainforest, Costa Rica:

Evergreen toad (Incilius coniferus). A common toad found in mid- and low-elevation rainforest. This species is one of the few true toads (Family: Bufonidae) that can readily climb vegetation, although they are also often found inside the burrows of other animals. They are highly toxic and probably have few predators:

Puma (Puma concolor) track. These big cats are common in rainforests through Costa Rica. We also have jaguars (Panthera onca), but jaguar tracks are the size of your hand, including the fingers!!, while puma tracks are the size of the palm of your hand. Because it had rained very hard the night before, I knew this track was less than 8 hours old!:

Atlantic Forest Toad (Incilius melanochlorus). Another common toad. This one declined dramatically with the arrival of chytrid fungus but now appears to have fully recovered:

A giant Ceiba tree (Ceiba pentandra). This is one of largest trees in Central America, reaching heights of over 70 meters. Because they often grown above the canopy (emergent tree), they are the favorite nesting sites of many raptors (e.g., Harpy Eagle, Harpia harpyja) where the elevated platform provides a good viewing point and relative safety from nest predators. This tree may be over 300 years old:

When I first saw this snake, I thought it was the highly venomous Fer-de-lance (Terciopelo in Costa Rican Spanish, Bothrops asper). However, this is the False Fer-de-lance (Xenodon rabdocephalus), a harmless mimic. I have often wondered if it is true case of mimicry trying to make potential predators think it is the deadly pit-viper or if its patten is actually an example of convergent evolution for camouflage. It might function in both ways in that it does provide great camouflage, but if spotted, it also has the pattern of something very dangerous!?:

JAC: I added a photo of a real fer-de-lance from Wikipedia:

thibaudaronson, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Readers’ wildlife photos

December 27, 2024 • 8:15 am

Send ’em in, folks! I’m running a bit low. . .

Today’s photos come from Mayaan Levy, whose captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

Pacific crest trail animals

All photos were taken by my husband Micah on his Pacific crest trail (PCT) thru-hike last summer. Thru-hiking means having a continuous footpath, and hiking the trail in one go, and he had dreamt of achieving this impressive feat for about 12 years. This was his third attempt – the first was cut short due to work constraints and the second due to knee injury. But third time’s the charm – he walked from Mexico to Canada. Here you can read more about the PCT for those of you who are interested: https://www.pcta.org/

This will probably be a first batch out of three: animals, plants and views from the PCT. All photos were taken with a pixel 7 smartphone. Several quick notes before we begin:

The trail is not only for 20-somethings, and Micah noted how many people in their 50s and 60s he met along the way and how fit and fast they were. Just sayin’ – if that’s your dream – go for it!

I did the species identification and some might be wrong – please contribute the correct ID if you know it.Captions and text are written by me but are paraphrased from Micah’s stories about the trail.

The desert

Looks barren, but is full of life. The air is clear and crisp at sunrise then turns dusty and hazy with some warm winds from the east and the day’s heat. At sunset, reds and pinks give way to deep purple as hikers go to sleep at a billion-star hotel.

Sun spider of some type (order Solifugae) – it’s not a scorpion! And also not a spider! To the best of my understanding they don’t have any venom.

Pacific gopher snake (Pituophis catenifer):

Long-nosed leopard lizard (Gambelia wislizenii):

The Sierra Nevada

The mountains high in thin air, snow all around, gushing rivers and pine trees galore! The Sierras are considered the most difficult section of the PCT and also probably the most beautiful. I did the section too with Micah on his second attempt, including summiting Mt. Whitney on the summer solstice.

abiete coni figmentum imaginationis – some hikers having fun (and me getting to practice my Latin).

Sagebrush chekerspot (Chlosyne acastus):

Yellow-bellied marmot (Marmota flaviventer) – marmots are hilarious. They tend to not be scared of people, and instead will try to get into your bag and steal your food. Sometimes they also like to pose for photos, and sometimes they tan on the rocks looking stoned:

Speaking of food thieves, in the Sierra hikers are required to carry bear canisters, which you can imagine as a bucket-size child (bear)-proof pill bottles. Information boards for hikers in Yosemite national park read: “if you have too much food and not all of it fits in the canister, stop! Sit and eat! Then try again.” In northern California most hikers ship their heavy bear canister back home. However, bears are clever animals and they have learned that food can be had at this location. Micah has set up his tent about 10 miles after shipping out his canister, only to have a bear circle his tent all night.

Another food thief, and the most dexterous one (I’ve seen them open zippers): the common raccoon (Procyon lotor), aka trash panda. They like to hang out around campgrounds, steal food and then act all innocent and go wash their hands:

Yes, there’s a lot of talk about food on trail – it’s probably the number one conversation topic.

Oregon and Washington

Yay Volcanos! The cascade range is magical in its deep, dark colors. And despite last year being extremely dry, you can tell that this environment is water-rich.

Cascades frog (Rana cascadae) – I think their skin is somewhat toxic to the touch, but I might be wrong:

This is a “find the animal” photo – there are actually two mammals here, sharing a habitat in the fog that’s so frequent in Washington’s mountains:

Pika (family Ochotonidea) – and the cutest animal on the PCT award goes to the pikas. They chirp (not sure that’s the right descriptor for their calls) saying “pet me!”, “adopt me!”. Unlike marmots which hibernate for the majority of the year, pikas run around in their rocky castles and continue to be cute throughout the winter:

Spruce grouse (Canachites Canadensis) spotted less than 10 miles from Canada:

Homo sapiens (I’m sure about this ID) – this is me in the photo. I joined Micah for Washington (Bridge of the Gods to the US-Canada border):

Readers’ wildlife photos

September 21, 2024 • 8:15 am

Today we have Part One of reader Chris Taylor’s photos from Queensland. His captions are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

After having been unable to travel for the last five years, I was at last able to get away again, so my partner and I decided to escape the cold of Canberra’s winter and travel up to tropical North Queensland. We had arranged to go out to the Bush Heritage Australia reserve at Yourka again, but before going there we had some time to visit the rainforest near the coast. After flying in to Cairns, we drove up to our first campsite in Mossman.

Above the town, the pristine Mossman River flows through a steep sided gorge.

The rainforest here is said to be the oldest on earth. Many ancient plant families are preserved here, including cycads, ferns and primitive conifers. We had a couple of short walks along the paths into the rainforest.

Our campground was on the banks of the Mossman River. A sign in the site was slightly alarming!

I’m not sure how often the crocodiles get up into the town.

But a few days later we travelled the few kilometres further north to the Daintree River, and there were plenty of crocodiles to be seen. There are two species of crocodile found in Australia, the smaller Freshwater Crocodile, and the larger Saltwater species.

This is a Saltwater Crocodile, Crocodylus porosus:

On the Daintree River, a dominant male will rule a territory of many kilometres of the river, and will keep a harem of females. The male will also tolerate a number of juvenile males until they are three or four years old, at which time they will be driven out of the area. Once fully grown they may return to the river to challenge the resident male for his territory and females.

This is a young male. He was only about 2.5m in length.

This is a female of breeding age. She is regulating her body temperature by entering the water, and gaping her mouth to the wind. There are many blood vessels in the roof of the mouth and this cools the blood going to her brain.

There is some concern in Queensland that climate change is having a big adverse effect on the crocodiles. The sex of the hatchling is determined by the temperature:  less than 32oC produces males, but over 34oC the litter is predominantly female. This warming, together with the effects of the flooding caused by Tropical Cyclone Jasper, has led to no young crocodiles surviving in the Daintree for two years.

We also saw the dominant male of this part of the river, a 5m long, 500kg animal known as Scarface.

He is thought to be at least 70 years old, and carries witness to many fights he has had to retain his kingdom. He has lost most if not all of his teeth, but is still able to feed, often on carrion that is carried down the river.

Lining the river banks are stands of Mangrove trees of different species. Here the mangroves are combining to form an island in the river. There are three different forms that the roots take to enable the tree to live in the brackish water.  All three can be seen in this picture.  Most obvious is the prop or stilt root system, where many roots branch off from the trunk of the tree and spread out to form a strong supporting network.  Then there are some that have Buttress roots flaring out from the trunk. These sometimes bend up above the surface before returning to the mud, and are called knee roots. Lastly there are the roots that stick up pencil-like structures known as pneumatophores. All of these are mechanisms that help the plant to regulate oxygen, salt and water intake and removal, and all help to stabilise the mud around the plant, as well as providing a habitat for fish and invertebrates to breed.

In amongst the mangroves were other creatures. This is a Little Pied Cormorant, Microcarbo melanoleucos, a very common bird around Australia.

Further upstream in one of mangroves was a Scrub Python, Simalia kinghorni:

This is Australia’s largest snake, growing to 5m and 20kg., but it is quite at home in the trees. It was resting in the sun when we first encountered it, but soon began to move around in the tree tops. This one was probably approaching the 3m mark. It was fascinating to see how it was able to span the gaps in the branches.

Back at Daintree we saw this White-Lipped Tree Frog, Litoria infrafrenata. This is the largest tree frog in the world. There are other larger frogs but these are unable to climb:

Back at Mossman, we photographed a Giant Orb Weaving spider, Nephila pilipes. This individual had a span across her legs of about 150mm, and a body of 25mm. Her web was rather more that 1m across!

Also in the campground were a number of Orange-footed Scrub Fowl, Megapodius reinwardt. These birds belong to the Megapodidae, along with the Brush Turkey that I will describe later:

There were also Olive-backed Sunbirds, Cinnyris jugularis, flying around the site. This one is a female emerging from the hanging nest made from woven grasses fibres and bark. It is the female who does most of the work of raising the two eggs laid in the nest:

There was also a spectacular display of Red Jade Vine, Mucuna bennettii. Introduced into Australia, this member of the Legume family is a native of Papua New Guinea:

Returning to Cairns for a night we were able to go for a swim in a nearby rainforest stream at the (crocodile free) Crystal Cascades:

Next morning, while waiting to board the bus to Atherton, we went to a café for breakfast. A cheeky Willie Wagtail, Rhipidura leucophrys, decided to join us in the hope of getting crumbs of food from the table.

Continued in Part 2.

 

Readers’ wildlife photos

July 10, 2024 • 8:45 am

I have about three batches left, so if you have wildlife photos, please send them in.

Today’s photos is the second installment of photos from Texas contributed by Damon Williford (part 1 is here).  Damon’s narrative and captions are indented, and you can enlarge his photos by clicking on them. Here’s his introduction to the set.

I took these photos at Brazos Bend State Park on June 23 of this year. Brazos Bend State Park is located about 45 miles south of central Houston and 45 miles north of Bay City where I live. The park contains a variety of habitats, including prairie, woodlands, marshes, swamps, and lakes. The Brazos River forms the eastern boundary of the park.

Eastern Cottontail (Sylvilagus floridanus):

A juvenile American Alligator (Alligator mississippiensis) hanging out near a footbridge:

Blanchard’s Cricket Frog (Acris blanchardi):

A male Eastern Pondhawk (Erythemis simplicicollis):

A Question Mark Butterfly (Polygonia interrogationis) feeding on a severed crayfish claw. I was aware that some species of butterflies will feed on carrion, but this was the first time I have personally observed it:

Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta):

Violet Ruellia (Ruellia nudiflora):

American Lotus (Nelumbo lutea):

American Lotus:

Water Hyacinth (Pontederia crassipes):

Mushrooms in the genus Chlorophyllum (maybe). That is the best I could do with the identification:

I used iNaturalist to help me identify the organisms in photos 14-22 because my ID skills become progressively worse as the list moves from amphibian (average) to plants (poor) to fungi (non-existent).

Camera information: I used a Canon EOS R7 mirrorless camera body for all photographs. I used the Canon RF800mm f/11 IS USM lens for photos 1-8, and the Canon RF100-400mm f/5.6-8 IS USM lens for the remaining photos.