Excidobates mysteriosus

Excidobates mysteriosus
Conservation status
Endangered  (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Amphibia
Order:	Anura
Family:	Dendrobatidae
Genus:	Excidobates
Species:	E. mysteriosus
Binomial name
Excidobates mysteriosus (Myers, 1982)
Synonyms
Dendrobates mysteriosus Myers, 1982 Ranitomeya mysteriosa Bauer, 1988 "Dendrobates" mysteriosus Grant, Frost, Caldwell, Gagliardo, Haddad, Kok, Means, Noonan, Schargel, and Wheeler, 2006 Excidobates mysteriosus Twomey and Brown, 2008

The Marañón poison frog (Excidobates mysteriosus) is a frog. It lives in Peru.

Body

The adult frog is about 27-29 mm long from nose to rear end. The skin of the frog's back is black with big white dots. There is always a dot under the chin.

Home

This frog is awake during the day. It lives in forests that have never been cut down that have spiny plants and bromeliad plants on the ground. They live near cliffs and look for food in small plants. Scientists have seen adult frogs and young frogs eating ants and flies. People have seen this frog between 600 and 1305 meters above sea level.

Young

These frogs only have young in the pools of water in bromeliad plants because there is not enough water anywhere else in the dry part of the year. The female frog lays the eggs on one part of the bromeliad plant. After the eggs hatch, the male frog carries the tadpoles to other pools in bromeliad plants. The bromeliad plants that the frogs need only grow on very old trees.

The tadpoles are black in color.

Danger

Scientists say these frogs are in danger of dying out. These frogs only live in a few small places. In the 1990s, people used to catch this frog to sell as a pet. Scientists say this might still be a danger to this frog.