Colostethus wayuu

Allobates wayuu is a 1999 discovered and scientifically described Froschlurch from the family Aromobatidae; first of the kind had yet been made ​​as Colostethus wayuu to the poison dart frogs ( Dendrobatidae ). The very small animals found exclusively in a narrow rain forest area in the extreme north- eastern Colombia.

Features

The frogs have a head -body length from 15.8 to 19.7 mm in females or 13.6 to 16.1 millimeters in males. The head is nearly ovoid seen from above. The width of the head is about 85 to 100 percent of its length in the males and from 80 to 102 per cent in the females, the length of the head 33 to 45 percent of the head-body length. The relatively large eye has a diameter of 68-100 percent ( males ) and 63-114 percent (females ) of the head length.

The medium sized front feet have a length of two -thirds of the length of the head. The fingers are of different length, the longest time is the third, followed by the fourth, second and first finger, the first finger can sometimes be as great as the second. In the males, the third finger is longer in proportion than in the females. The nostrils and lips are not emphasized.

The hind legs have a length 41-56 percent (females ) or 47 to 55 percent ( males ) of the head -body length, of which the feet make the most from (40 to 53% of head-body length). Between the first and second toe is missing the webbing between the other it is still rudimentary.

The adhesive discs of all fingers and toes are widened with the exception of the third finger and fourth toe and have a diameter of about one -third of a phalanx. On the second finger and the fourth toe are medium sized Hautwülste, on the palms there are small nodules. An externally visible fold at the tarsus missing.

Head and trunk are coffee brown on the dorsal side, the limbs are cream-colored, patterned hind legs with dark coffee-colored strokes. The sides are also dark coffee brown, between the belly and side is a cream-colored ribbon-like drawing, another between the back and side occurs in some specimens produced hardly a lateral linear drawing is oblique and short. The upper lip is a light cream color. Throat and abdominal region are spotted cream and pale gray - coffee-colored, adhesive discs dark brown, the white balls.

Distribution and habitat

Allobates wayuu is only in a mountain forest in Parque Nacional Natural de Macuira on the Guajira Peninsula in the extreme northeastern Colombia ( Sierranía Macuira, La Guajira Department ) occurring at altitudes 210-780 m Art The approximately 243 -square-kilometer area of ​​distribution lies in a rainforest area, which is surrounded by dry forests. Due to the isolated habitat additional occurrences are currently considered unlikely.

Way of life

The entire population gathers in the dry season in August in the canyon " El Chorro ". There the animals found under rocks in the immediate vicinity of pools and temporary ponds, still lead the remaining water from the rainy season. In the mating season the males show a very territorial and fight for the females. To call it climbing on exposed stones lying or boulders, so as to reach the advantage of improved Rufwarte. The mating takes place mainly in the morning hours. The nests are placed in moist, covered in leaves hollows where then held the embryonic development. The hatched tadpoles are then carried by the male on his back to streams and ponds, where they carry out their further larval development to metamorphosis.

In the rainy season the animals are relatively common nowadays. They are in groups can be found in the neighboring woods, the males carry the tadpoles on their backs doing with it.

Status and risk

From the World Conservation Union IUCN Allobates was wayuu 2001 because of its extremely limited distribution area as " endangered" ( vulnerable ) classified. As the area is located in a National Park and adjacent to the reserve area is sparsely populated, there is for the frogs currently no existence -threatening hazard.

In the IUCN Red List, however, numerous tropical anurans are listed whose stocks have declined in the last 20 years, partly due to unexplained way in very short periods of time. Particularly affected here are Panama, Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela, where several Atelopus and other Froschlurch species already be classified as " lost " as. Direct intervention in the habitats are not so much under suspicion for the disappearance. The American herpetologist Andrew Blaustein discussed in this context as one of the possible causes of the current global warming. In particular, global increased UV -B radiation can be very harmful to amphibians. For most diurnal Dendrobatiden this could play a role.

System

The species was first described in 1999 by Andrés Acosta - Galvis, Daniel of Audit and Luis Coloma under the name Colostethus wayuu. The Style epithet honors the resident on the Guajira Peninsula ethnicity of Wayúu. The type was provided by the descriptors in the kinship group of Colostethus inguinalis.

As part of a comprehensive phylogenetic revision of the family of Dendrobatidae was proposed in 2006, the way to put in the genus Allobates and assign the newly created Aromobatidae due to the simultaneous division of the family.

Documents

• Allobates wayuu on AmphibiaWeb (English)
• AR Acosta, D. A. Cuentas, L. A. Coloma: Una nueva de especie Colostethus ( Anura: Dendrobatidae ) de la región del Caribe de Colombia. In: Revista de la Academia Colombiana de Ciencias Exactas, físicas y Naturales (Special Suppl ). 23, 1999, pp. 225-230.