Yellow Dyer Rain Frog Discovered in Mountains of Western Panama
Posted on May 22, 2012
A new bright yellow frog species has been found in the mountains of western Panama. The frog belongs to a group of rainfrogs that lack a tadpole stage. They develop directly as little frogs inside the egg. The frog measures less than 2 cm. It was discovered by Andreas Hertz and his colleagues, who are reptile and amphibian specialists at the Senckenberg Research Institute in Frankfurt. They discovered it in 2010 during several field trips to the Serrania de Tabasara of western Panama a highly understudied part of the Panamanian central mountain range.
The researchers discovered that the frogs release a yellow dye on the skin when handled. The researchers say they could not find any poisonous components in the yellow dye.
Hertz says, "Although we recognized that the male mating call of this species differs from all what we had heard before and therefore suspected it to be new, much effort was involved to finally spot it in the dense vegetation. When we finally caught the first individuals by hand, we noticed that it dyes one's fingers yellow when it is handled. The scientific name (Diasporus citrinobapheus) of this new frog refers to this characteristic and means yellow dyer rainfrog."
The study was published here in ZooKeys.
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