''Adelphobates galactonotus'' (splash-backed poison frog or splashback poison frog) is a species of

poison dart frog Poison dart frog (also known as dart-poison frog, poison frog or formerly known as poison arrow frog) is the common name of a group of frogs in the family Dendrobatidae which are native to tropical Central and South America. These species are ...

. It is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to the rainforest of the southern

Amazon Basin The Amazon basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributaries. The Amazon drainage basin covers an area of about , or about 35.5 percent of the South American continent. It is located in the countries of Bolivi ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

. Its natural

habitat In ecology, the term habitat summarises the array of resources, physical and biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species habitat can be seen as the physical ...

s are tropical moist lowland

forest A forest is an area of land dominated by trees. Hundreds of definitions of forest are used throughout the world, incorporating factors such as tree density, tree height, land use, legal standing, and ecological function. The United Nations' ...

s. The eggs are laid on the ground, but the

tadpoles A tadpole is the larval stage in the biological life cycle of an amphibian. Most tadpoles are fully aquatic, though some species of amphibians have tadpoles that are terrestrial. Tadpoles have some fish-like features that may not be found in ...

are carried to temporary pools. Though it remains widespread and locally common, it is threatened by

habitat loss Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...

and has already disappeared from some localities due to

deforestation Deforestation or forest clearance is the removal of a forest or stand of trees from land that is then converted to non-forest use. Deforestation can involve conversion of forest land to farms, ranches, or urban use. The most concentrated d ...

and flooding caused by

dam A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use, a ...

s. The species is relatively common in captivity and regularly bred, but the wild populations are still at risk from illegal collection. The best known variants of this species are black below and yellow, orange or red above, but its color is extremely variable with some having whitish-

mint MiNT is Now TOS (MiNT) is a free software alternative operating system kernel for the Atari ST system and its successors. It is a multi-tasking alternative to TOS and MagiC. Together with the free system components fVDI device drivers, XaAES g ...

or light blue upperparts, some having a mottled or spotted pattern above, and some being almost all whitish (popularly known as "moonshine" among captive frog keepers), yellow-orange or black. It has been speculated that some morphs were separate species, but genetic testing have revealed virtually no difference between them (including a distinctive variant from

Cristalino State Park The Cristalino State Park ( pt, Parque Estadual do Cristalino) is a state park in the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil. Location The Cristalino State Park is in the municipalities of Alta Floresta and Novo Mundo in the extreme north of Mato Grosso, b ...

with a yellow-and-black netted pattern) and the distributions of the morphs do not follow a clear geographic pattern as expected if they were separate species. This relatively large poison dart frog has a snout-vent length of up to .

References

External links

galactonotus Amphibians of Brazil Endemic fauna of Brazil Amphibians described in 1864 Taxa named by Franz Steindachner Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{Dendrobatidae-stub