Species Spotlight: Darwin’s Frog
Species spotlight:
Blueahghug, ptooey, sorry, we were trying out what it's like to be a male Darwin’s frog and carry my tadpoles in my mouth; we wouldn't recommend it. Read on to find out more about this weird behaviour and what else makes Darwin’s frogs so unique!
Names & Nicknames: Darwin’s frog, Southern Darwin’s frog, Ranita de Darwin, Sapito Vaquero
Size: Dwarfed by the likes of a Goliath Frog, these little critters will comfortably fit on your finger tip at around 2-3cm from butt to nose and 5.5 grams in weight. As with many frogs, such as our purple queens, the females are a bit bigger than the males.
Communication: Darwin's frogs, like many frogs, communicates by singing to each other. In their case, this takes the form of a loud ‘peep-like’ call. Male Darwin's frogs can even keep calling with a mouth full of tadpoles! (see Glow-up section)
Favourite Hangout: Moist and mossy. They are found in the damp undergrowth of rainforests and bogs in Southern Chile and Argentina.
Favourite Snack: They aren’t fussy feeders. If it crawls around and is crunchy, they will eat it, feeding on a range of small invertebrates such as crickets, grasshoppers, ants, flying insects, spiders, beetles, centipedes, and millipedes.
Eating Habits: A Darwin's frog's hunting strategy has been coined the ‘sit and wait’, an age-old strategy that consists of ‘sitting’ and ‘waiting’ for some tasty prey to come crawling your way!
Love Language: Darwin’s frog couples find each other using their romantic ‘peep’ calls. Once a couple is united, the male will lead the female to a sheltered area where they can get down to business.
If you see them: At around 3cm in size and with their green colouration, they can be pretty much impossible to spot on the forest floor, and as humans are one of the main spreaders of the deadly chytrid fungus (see red flags), they would probably prefer if you stayed away anyway!
Red Flags: Their main red flags are habitat loss, climate change, and the deadly chytrid fungus. Chytrid, or chytridiomycosis if you are feeling fancy, is a deadly fungal disease that is affecting amphibians worldwide, and the plucky little Darwin’s frog is unfortunately no exception.
Epic Journeys: Darwin’s frogs don't hop around too much on their own, but in 2024, 53 Darwin's frogs made the 6-hour boat, 15-hour car ride and 15-hour flight from their forest in Chile to London thanks to our friends at the Zoological Society of London. As the wild population is at threat from nasty things like chytrid (read above), this successful relocation will make sure the species stays alive, helps us learn more about them, and since 33 froglets have already been born, it can help grow the wild population!
Glow-up: After a female has laid her eggs, her job is done; time for the daddy frog to step in. The male will stay close to the eggs until they start wriggling and are ready to hatch, when he will then promptly… eat them!?! Well, not quite, he places them into his mouth where they then slide into his vocal sac (the stretchy bit under a frog's chin that they use to call). Once in there, the tadpoles continue to develop until 50-70 days later, the father is ready to cough them out as fully formed froglets. Alongside their cousin, the Northern Darwin’s frog, these are the only frog species that do this!
Facts: A small frog can have a lot of predators, so Darwin’s frog's signature defence mechanism is to lie on their back and play dead, sometimes for as long as 30 minutes. Talk about dramaaaaa!
Who are they in the friendship group: Small, squelchy, and mysterious.
Name:
Darwin’s Frog
Habitat:
Damp mossy undergrowth in temperate rainforests in Chile and Argentina
Diet:
Invertebrates
Size:
2.2 - 3.1cm in length and up to 5.5g in weight
Behaviour:
Solitary and mainly diurnal
Predators:
Snakes and tapaculos (a family of birds)
Lifespan:
~ 11 years
Threats:
Habitat loss, disease (chytrid), climate change
Conservation status:
Endangered
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Where to from here?
Need more? Listen to the Animal Sensemaker Podcast
Episode 31 highlights our hero, the Darwin Frog. Listen here.
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