Escudo de la República de Colombia Escudo de la República de Colombia
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✎ Camila Espinosa

✎ Camila Espinosa

✎ Diego Aguilera

Golden Poison Frog
Phyllobates terribilisPacific region

  • Generalities
  • Morpho-functionality
  • Lifecycle
  • Distribution

RECORRIDO VIRTUAL POR LA BIODIVERSIDAD DE COLOMBIA
Museo de Historia Natural
Universidad Nacional de Colombia

Golden Poison Frog
Phyllobates terribilis

It is one of the largest dendrobatids, adult males reach a face-cloaca length between 37 and 44 mm and females 40 and 46 mm, it is endemic to the Colombian Pacific. Perhaps it is the most toxic vertebrate on the planet, its poison is a type of batrachotoxin that is found in the skin. It feeds mainly on termites and ants. It is in danger due to the illegal trafficking of species. Once in captivity, it loses its toxicity after a year since the poison comes from the transformation of its diet.

Conservation status

Extinct

Extinct in the Wild

Critically Endangered

Endangered

Vulnerable

Near Threatened

Least Concern

Not Evaluated

Data Deficient

Morpho-functionality

Skin

The coloration of this species of frog is aposematic, which means that it serves as a warning of the chemical defense mechanism that it has against predators.

Vocal sacs

Males have indentations or vocal sacs under the jaw, which they inflate and use to sing, woo females, and defend their territory.

Breathing

Despite having lungs, they also breathe through the skin through gas exchange.

Lifecycle

During the reproductive season, males sing to attract females and to maintain their territory, after attracting them, a courtship is presented that includes visual, auditory and tactile signals. At the end of the courtship, the female deposits the eggs in the litter and the male fertilizes them by apposition of cloacas (approximation of the cloaca of the female and the male). It lays between eight to fifteen eggs, these hatch in two weeks and when they reach the 25th stage of development they are transported by the male to bodies of water, they finish their metamorphosis after two months and their sexual maturity is reached one year.

Golden Poison Frog

Distribution

Its geographic range is very limited, it can be found in small areas on the Colombian Pacific coast, mainly in the humid jungle of the departments of Chocó, Cauca and Valle del Cauca, its altitudinal distribution is between 50 and 200 m.

Distribution area