Rhinoderma rufum

The Chile Darwin's frog or Norther Darwin's frog  (Rhinoderma rufum) is a frog.   It lives in Chile and Argentina.

Body
Adult male frogs are about 31 mm long from nose to rear end and adult female frogs are about 33 mm long. These frogs have fleshy noses. All four legs are thin.  There is a lot of webbed skin on the back feet. Different frogs can be different colors. The skin of the frog's back can be light brown, medium brown, red-brown, light green dark green, or a mix of brown and green. The skin of the frog's back has black and white spots.

Home
The frog lives on the ground. People find this frog on the dead leaves on the ground in forests with different kinds of trees in them and in small streams in forests.  Scientists saw this frog between 0 and 500 meters above sea level.

Food
Scientists think this frog sits still and waits for smaller animals to come close enough for the frog to catch them. It eats insects and other animals without bones.

Young
These frogs are different from other frogs because the male frog keeps the young in his body. The female frog lays eggs on the dead leaves on the ground. She lays 12-24 eggs at a time. The male frog watches the eggs. Once the tadpole is big enough to move inside its egg, about eight days, the male frog puts the eggs in his mouth. The eggs do not go to the frog's stomach. They go to the frog's vocal sac, the organ he uses to make sounds. The eggs hatch inside the male frog's vocal sac and the tadpoles stay there until their jaws and stomach and other organs are strong enough to work. Then the male frog brings the tadpoles to streams, where the tadpoles swim and find food.

Danger
Scientists say this frog is in big danger of dying out, and it may already be dead.  Human beings cut down too many trees to make pine tree farms and build second houses. Scientists think the fungal disease chytridiomycosis killed many of these frogs.

References

Category:Frogs of South America