Oophaga speciosa

The splendid poison frog or splendid poison arrow frog (Oophaga speciosa) is a frog.  It lived in Panama and Ecuador. This frog is extinct: there are none alive now.

Appearance
Male and female adult frogs were 28-31  mm long from nose to rear end. This frog was bright red in color.  But when it is dead and kept in chemicals in jars, it is gray with a few spots.

Home
This frog lived in cloud forests in the Cordillera de Talamanca mountains. It moved around during the day. People saw this frog between  1140 and 1410 meters above sea level.

Young
The male frogs fight each other for good places to look for food and for females to lay eggs.

The female frog takes care of the eggs and tadpoles. She lays eggs on dead leaves on the ground. After the eggs hatch, she carries tadpoles to plants that have water in their leaves in small pools.  The female frog lays eggs that will not hatch for the tadpoles to eat.

Danger

The last time people saw this frog in its home was 1992. People took frogs from Panama to the United States to sell as pets. Scientists looked for the frog in 2008, 2009, and 2010 and did not find any.

Scientists saw the fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis on this frog, and they think it is part of why the frogs died. Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis causes the fungal disease chytridiomycosis. They also believe that people cut down too much forest to build towns and farms and to get wood to build with.

Scientists think some of these frogs may still be alive, living as people's pets far from Panama, but they do not know for sure.

References

Category:Frogs of South America