The barred frogs are a group of frogs in the genus ''Mixophyes''. They are the largest of the

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

n ground

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely Carnivore, carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order (biology), order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-f ...

s, from the family Myobatrachidae. The barred frogs are native to the eastern coast of Australia, with one species inhabiting

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu Hiri Motu, also known as Police Motu, Pidgin Motu, or just Hiri, is a language of Papua New Guinea, which is spoken in surrounding areas of Port Moresby (Capital of Papua New Guinea). It is a simplified version of ...

. They are restricted to

rainforest Rainforests are characterized by a closed and continuous tree canopy, moisture-dependent vegetation, the presence of epiphytes and lianas and the absence of wildfire. Rainforest can be classified as tropical rainforest or temperate rainfores ...

s and wet

sclerophyll Sclerophyll is a type of vegetation that is adapted to long periods of dryness and heat. The plants feature hard leaf, leaves, short Internode (botany), internodes (the distance between leaves along the stem) and leaf orientation which is paral ...

forests. They often habit under moist leaf litter, where they hunt small

invertebrate Invertebrates are a paraphyletic group of animals that neither possess nor develop a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''backbone'' or ''spine''), derived from the notochord. This is a grouping including all animals apart from the chordate ...

s. The males will also call from leaf litter close to a water source. It is suspected that the barred frog tadpoles eat carrion, if available, after both

great barred frog The great barred frog (''Mixophyes fasciolatus'') is an Australian ground-dwelling frog of the genus ''Mixophyes''. Description The great barred frog reaches a size of 8 centimetres and has large, powerful legs. It has a dark brown dorsal surfa ...

(''Mixophyes fasciolatus'') and

Fleay's barred frog Fleay's barred frog (''Mixophyes fleayi'') is a large species of frog restricted to small pockets of rainforest in northern New South Wales and south-eastern Queensland, Australia. Distribution This species has a fragmented distribution in wet f ...

(''Mixophyes fleayi'') tadpoles have both been observed eating carrion. The genus consists of large frogs; the

giant barred frog The giant barred frog (''Mixophyes iteratus'') is a species of barred frog found in Australia. It occurs from south-eastern Queensland to just south of the Newcastle region in New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales ...

is the second largest frog in Australia. All species have visible tympanums,

maxilla The maxilla (plural: ''maxillae'' ) in vertebrates is the upper fixed (not fixed in Neopterygii) bone of the jaw formed from the fusion of two maxillary bones. In humans, the upper jaw includes the hard palate in the front of the mouth. The t ...

ry and

vomerine teeth The vomer (; lat, vomer, lit=ploughshare) is one of the unpaired facial bones of the skull. It is located in the midsagittal line, and articulates with the sphenoid, the ethmoid, the left and right palatine bones, and the left and right maxill ...

, powerful legs, and webbed feet.

Species

References

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q2186920 Myobatrachidae Mixophyes Taxa named by Albert Günther