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Poison dart frogs are tiny amphibians, from one half to three inches long.
- Poison dart frog skin
oozes toxin. A toxin is a poison made by a plant or animal.
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Rainforest Indians roast dart frogs to extract toxin for their arrows. Indians hunt for food, and arrows are the best way to kill animals that live high in rainforest tree tops.
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Snakes and birds that make the mistake of eating poison dart frogs get terrible bellyaches and may die.
- Most animals know better than to eat a dart frog. They are
warned away by the brilliant spots and stripes, called "warning coloration."
- Male dart frogs
wrestle to defend their
territory on the forest floor.
- They
buzz and
chirp to attract female frogs by forcing air from their vocal sacs through slits in the backs of their throats.
- Dart frogs begin their lives as
tadpoles, living in water and breathing through gills.
- Tadpoles have no legs--just big heads and tails. As they mature, they
morph! They absorb their tails, grow four legs, and replace gills with lungs.
- "Morph" is an abbreviation for
metamorphosis, a profound change in form.
- When tadpoles
hatch from their eggs, a parent frog helps them onto its back and carries them into a tree, one or two at a time. It finds tiny pools of water--big enough for swimming tadpoles--in plants called bromeliads.
- Tadpole dung
fertilizes bromeliads.
- Frogs and bromeliads rely on each other. This is called
mutualism.
- Dart frog's have
tiny suction cups on their
toes that cling to slippery leaves and branches.
- Their
skin is moist and sticky, and it absorbs oxygen from the air.
- They
eat termites, ants, flies, crickets, and other
insects, which they catch with quick flicks of their sticky tongues.
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