Epipedobates machalilla

Epipedobates machalilla is a frog.  It lives in Ecuador.

Body
The adult male frog is 14.4 - 16.0 mm long from nose to rear end and the adult female frog is 15.0 – 17.6  mm long. The skin of the frog's back is brown in color. The sides of the body are dark brown or black in color. Parts of the mouth are cream-yellow in color with some pink. There is a stripe on the side of the body. It is either cream-white or cream-yellow with some pink color. The front legs are light orange in color. The tops of the back legs are light brown in color. The belly is cream-white in color. There is an orange spot near where the back legs meet the body. The iris of the eye is gold in color.

Home
This frog lives in tropicla forests. It can live in very dry parts of the forest. Sometimes people see it on banana farms and cocoa farms. Scientists saw the frog between 10 and 600 meters above sea level.

Some of the places this frog lives are protected parks: Parque Nacional Machalilla, Reserva Jouneche, Reserva Ecológica Manglares Churute.

Young
The female frog lays eggs on the ground or in the dead leaves on the ground.  She lays about 15 eggs at a time. After the eggs hatch, the male frogs carry the tadpoles to water. They watch the tadpoles and scare other animals away.

This frog's eggs are smaller and have less color than any other eggs in Epipedobates. The eggs are about 1.6 mm across.

Danger
Scientists say this frog is not in danger of dying out. However, it can be in some danger if people change its forest. People cut down trees to make farms, to get wood to build with, and to make places for animals to eat grass. Mining and big changes to the weather could also hurt this frog.

References

Category:Frogs of South America
Category:Poison dart frogs