World's tiniest frogs

 Image courtesy of ZooKeys.

 

This weekend, I was discussing with my friend Ramesh, the recent discovery of new frogs in Wayanad, Naturally our conversation veered towards the World's tiniest frogs that have just been discovered in Papua New Guinea by Dr Fred Kraus.

Two new species in the miniaturized microhylid frog genusPaedophryne were discovered from the forests in south-eastern Papua New Guinea. The first species is described on the basis of two specimens and exhibits female snout-vent length of 8.5–9.0 mm (no males known), whereas that of the second species, described on the basis of 12 specimens, is 8.8–9.3 mm, with males 8.1–8.9 mm. They are currently the smallest known species of tetrapods and inhabit leaf litter

Journal reference

At the lower size limit for tetrapods, two new species of the miniaturized frog genus Paedophryne (Anura, Microhylidae), Fred Kraus

ZooKeys 154 (2011) : 71-88