I will, at some stage, stop posting about tiny critters. But not today. No, today we’re looking at this itty-bitty frog species, Amauensis, a part of the newly described genus Paedophryne. The average body size of the species is 7.7mm, which is about 60 per cent smaller than a five-cent coin.
Herptologist Chris Austin and colleagues from Louisiana State University located this micro-sized wonder in the depths of New Guinea. They weren’t armed with electron microscope goggles so, as you can imagine, this wasn’t the easiest frog to find. Fortunately, where eyes failed, ears prevailed; the males have a “high-pitched insect-like” mating call.
According to the Huffington Post, Paedophryne amauensis snatched the the throne of smallest vertebrate from a species of Indonesian fish, itself managing an average size of 8mm. Hopefully it wasn’t gunning for a permanent spot in the book of Guinness World Records.
Imagine if north-eastern Australia was troubled by these guys instead of cane toads? I don’t know if it’d be better or worse, but the situation would definitely, definitely be cuter.
Grim
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 12:49 PMPsst… Logan! Frogs and fish are vertebrates ;)
Logan Booker
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 1:04 PMBah, I totally missed that, didn’t I? Thanks for being so kind about the correction.
Titsnass
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 1:06 PMAnd that’s an American dime, which is worth 10 cents!! Should have a US flag on this story eh!
Logan Booker
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 1:50 PMThey are about the same size, yeah.
Sadly, they didn’t take snaps of the frog with coins from every country, so this will have to do! :P
Jackson Bison
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 8:02 AMAnd exactly where did it say in the article that the frog is worth 5 cents?
Antipodean
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 10:12 AMThe coin’s not worth the five cents that Booker was on about though is it!
Matt
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 1:25 PMFree the Paedos!!!
Unfortunate name. I also feel sorry for pediatricians in, shall we say, less enlightened communities.
Marcus
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 3:47 PMHerptologist is a very unfortunate name. Also, it is apparently spelt Herpetologist.
Bob
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 10:46 PMMmh… Looks like chocolate xD yumm
Dennison
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 11:48 PMA customer came into our shop and said he registered the business name “herpman” for his snake catching business. He didn’t use it realising not everyone knows what herpetology is.
Nads
Monday, January 16, 2012 at 9:49 AMso where do I get one of these?