Indian scientists discover frog species with strange sex lives

India Today 16 Sep 11;

It seems it is literally raining new frog species this monsoon.

Indian scientists have discovered as many as one dozen new species of frogs and rediscovered three lost ones in the biodiversity hotspot of the Western Ghats.

They have also recorded strange courtship and mating behaviour among tadpoles. It has been found for the first that at least six of the new species have a unique trait - they can produce offspring without actually mating or having intercourse.

The new species, as well as their strange sex lives, have been discovered by Professor S. D. Biju of Delhi University and described in the latest issue of the International Journal of Zoological Taxonomy.

Researchers from the Bombay Natural History Society, the Zoological Survey of India and Vrije University, Brussels, were part of the team.

Biju said: "The female approaches the calling male and shows her interest by touching the male on the head with her hind limb. The male then approaches the female and takes her in a loose embrace temporarily. Immediately afterwards, the female lays eggs on dead leaves. The male then sits on the eggs to release seminal fluid. There is no intercourse during fertlisation." Biju, a leading expert on amphibians, is credited with the discovery of 45 new species, including the smallest frog and the first Indian canopy frog.

The new species were identified after a thorough revision of the night frog genus called Nyctibatrachus, based on extensive field studies in the forest areas that run through Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Goa and Maharashtra.

Six of the new species were found in unprotected, highly degraded areas and require immediate steps to conserve them.

"Night frogs require a unique habitat - either fast- flowing streams or moist forest floor for breeding and survival," Biju said.

"The major threat to amphibians in India is massive habitat loss.

Conservation efforts for amphibians will indirectly help conserve other important biodiversities of that area," he added.

The rediscovered species are the Kempholey Night Frog, found after 75 years, Coorg Night Frog, found after 91 years, and Forest Night Frog, sighted after 75 years.

"Frogs are environmental barometers and are very sensitive to subtle changes in their environment. They lived alongside dinosaurs, which have long since disappeared. Amazingly, frogs continue to exist," Biju said.


Meowing Night Frog, Other New Species Found
Gallery on National Geographic 16 Sep 11;

A unique "catcall" inspired the name of the meowing night frog, one of 12 new species of frogs found recently in western India, a new study says.

The 1.4-inch (3.5-centimeter) frog Nyctibatrachus pooch—"pooch" meaning "domestic cat" in the local Indian language—has a "secretive lifestyle," hiding out inside rock crevices in the states of Western Ghats-Kerala and Tamil Nadu, said Biju Das, a biologist at the University of Delhi.

Between 1994 and 2010, Das and colleagues scoured forests along Indian's western coast for nocturnal, stream-dwelling frogs in the poorly studied genus Nyctibatrachus. In addition to revealing the 12 new species, the team rediscovered 3 species thought extinct, according to the study, published September 15 in the journalZootaxa.

The research is part of an ongoing search for lost amphibians in India, an offshoot of a global effort led by Conservation International in 2010.

The wider search was most focused on rediscovering ten amphibian species of high scientific and aesthetic value—of which only one was found.

—Christine Dell'Amore

Scientists discover 12 new frog species in India
Katy Daigle Associated Press Google News 17 Sep 11;

NEW DELHI (AP) — Years of combing tropical mountain forests, shining flashlights under rocks and listening for croaks in the night have paid off for a team of Indian scientists which has discovered 12 new frog species plus three others thought to have been extinct.

It's a discovery the team hopes will bring attention to India's amphibians and their role in gauging the health of the environment.

Worldwide, 32 percent of the world's known amphibian species are threatened with extinction, largely because of habitat loss or pollution, according to the group Global Wildlife Conservation.

"Frogs are extremely important indicators not just of climate change, but also pollutants in the environment," said the project's lead scientist, biologist Sathyabhama Das Biju of the University of Delhi.

Many of the newly found frogs in India are rare and are living in just a single area, so they will need rigorous habitat protection, Biju told The Associated Press on Saturday. "Unfortunately in India, conservation has basically focused on the two most charismatic animals — the elephant and the tiger. For amphibians there is little interest, little funding, and frog research is not easy."

Night frogs are extremely hard to find, coming out only at dark and during the monsoon season, living either in fast-flowing streams or on moist forest ground.

Biju said he and his student researchers had to sit in dark, damp forests listening for frog sounds and shining flashlights under rocks and across riverbeds. They confirmed the new species by description as well as genetics.

The 12 new species include the meowing night frog, whose croak sounds more like a cat's call, the jog night frog, unique in that both the males and females watch over the eggs, and the Wayanad night frog, which grows to about the size of a baseball or cricket ball. "It's almost like a monster in the forest floor, a huge animal for a frog, leaping from one rock to another," Biju said.

Three other species were rediscovered, including the Coorg night frog described 91 years ago, after scientists "had completely ignored these animals, thinking they were lost."

The discoveries — published in the latest issue of international taxonomy journal Zootaxa — bring the known number of frogs in India to 336. Biju estimated this was only around half of what is in the wild, and said none of India's amphibians are yet being studied for biological compounds that could be of further use in science.

"We first have to find the species, know them and protect them, so that we can study them for their clinical importance," he said.

Biju is credited with discovering dozens of new Indian frog species during his 35-year career.