Pedostibes tuberculosus

The Malabar tree toad, Western Ghats tree toad, or warty Asian tree toad (Pedostibes tuberculosus) is a species of frog. It lives in India.

Body
The adult frog is  35.0 - 47.2 mm long from nose to rear end. The skin of the frog's back is brown-gray in color with dark marks. The belly is white with black marks. There is a white stripe from each eye to the where the front legs meet the body. There is another white stripe on the body. This frog has many bumps on its skin.

Name
Scientists named the frog tuberculosus because of the bumps on its skin, called "tubercules" in English. People call it "Malabar tree toad" in English because the place where scientists found it was called "Malabar" in the past.

Home
This frog can climb trees. It mostly lives in evergreen forests high on the flat land, but it can live in other forests too. People see them on near streams and on plants. Scientists saw this frog between 300 and 1800 meters above sea level.

Scientists have seen this frog in protected places: Konya Wild Life Sanctuary, Cotigao Wild Life Sanctuary, Indira Ghandi National Park, Kalakad-Mundanthurai Tiger Reserve, Ponmudi Hills National Park, and Silent Valley National Park.

Young
This frog has young when the monsoon rains start. The tadpoles swim in streams. The tadpoles have suckers on their bodies. Scientists think they eat plants from the bottoms of the streams. The youngest tadpoles are clear in color except for the yolk sac. As they grow, they turn brown, sometimes with silver marks.

Danger
Scientists from the IUCN say this frog is not in danger of dying out. Human beings change the places where the frog lives to make farms and other things that people use. People also make dams and change streams. People also hit the frog with cars. Because the frogs make groups of 10-15 during the breeding season, people can hit many frogs at the same time.

Climate change could hurt this frog. This frog has young at only one time: the beginning of the monsoon rains. If the rains move, the frog could stop having young.

In 2020, scientists looked at the frogs to see if the dangerous fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis was living on them. They did not find any of the fungus. But they did find the fungus on other frogs in the same place. That means that the fungal disease chytridiomycosis might be a danger to P. tuberculosus and might not.

References

Category:Frogs of Asia
Category:State symbols of Karnataka