The La Loma tree frog (''Hyloscirtus colymba'') is a species of

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

in the family

Hylidae Hylidae is a wide-ranging family of frogs commonly referred to as "tree frogs and their allies". However, the hylids include a diversity of frog species, many of which do not live in trees, but are terrestrial or semiaquatic. Taxonomy and ...

found in Costa Rica,

Panama Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Co ...

, and expected but not confirmed in Colombia. 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 and

montane forest Montane ecosystems are found on the slopes of mountains. The alpine climate in these regions strongly affects the ecosystem because temperatures fall as elevation increases, causing the ecosystem to stratify. This stratification is a crucial ...

s, with breeding taking place in streams. 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

chytridiomycosis Chytridiomycosis ( ) is an infectious disease in amphibians, caused by the chytrid fungi '' Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis'' and '' Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans''. Chytridiomycosis has been linked to dramatic population declines or extinc ...

. The common name refers to La Loma, its type locality on the trail between

Chiriquí Lagoon Chiriquí Lagoon is a large lagoon on the northwest coast of Panama covering an area of about . It is separated from the Caribbean Sea by the Valiente Peninsula to the east and from Almirante Bay by islands in the Bocas del Toro Archipelago to t ...

and Boquete, in the

Bocas del Toro Province Bocas del Toro (; meaning "Mouth of the Bull") is a province of Panama. Its area is 4,643.9 square kilometers, comprising the mainland and nine main islands. The province consists of the Bocas del Toro Archipelago, Bahía Almirante (Almirante B ...

of Panama.

Description

This attractive, small, green or brown, stream-breeding frog has a faint orange or creamy eye stripe, with occasional dark flecking and webbed fingers and toes. Adult males are 31–37 mm long, while females can be larger, growing up to 39 mm. Adult males have a creamy colored mental gland on the chin, a pale bluish-green throat and a single gular sac, and no nuptial pads. It can be distinguished morphologically from '' Hyloscirtus palmeri'', which lacks the eye stripe, and from ''

Isthmohyla angustilineata The narrow-lined tree frog (''Isthmohyla angustilineata'') is a species of frogs in the family Hylidae found in the mountains of Costa Rica and western Panama. Its natural habitats are humid lower montane rainforests. It is a nocturnal species th ...

'', which has a stripe continuing to the groin area and no finger webbing.Savage, J. (2002) Amphibians and Reptiles of Costa Rica, University of Chicago Press

Larvae

Tadpole 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 ...

s are large and bronze colored, with large, irregular gold flecks, and can grow up to 37 mm long, and metamorphs are 17–19 mm. Larvae are well-equipped for grazing, with an inferior oral disc consisting of a beak and 6-7/7-10 denticle rows. They tend to live in fast-flowing streams in rock piles, and are nocturnal.

Breeding

Males make high-pitched cricket-like chirps from beneath rocks and plants near swift-flowing streams, and stop calling at the slightest disturbance, making them very difficult to catch. Field observations fro
Panama Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project
operations in Cerro Brewster found the males were unusually prominent when sick with

Conservation

Where extant, these frogs are probably more abundant than people realize, because of their highly secretive behavior. However, ''H. colymba'' adults have completely disappeared from stream sites in western Panama due to

. Tadpoles are also susceptible, exhibiting loss of keratinized mouthparts when infected. Because they have now disappeared from much of their western chytridiomycosis-infected range, these frogs were ranked as high priority for ''ex situ'' conservation in an

amphibian ark The Amphibian Ark (or AArk) is a joint effort of three principal partners: the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA), the IUCN/SSC Conservation Breeding Specialist Group (CBSG), and the IUCN/SSC Amphibian Specialist Group (ASG). The A ...

assessment. An ''ex situ'' assurance colony has been established by the Panama Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project based in Panama City, where the species was first bred in captivity in 2010.http://www.amphibianrescue.org (201
Rescue Project First To Breed Critically Endangered Tree Frog
/ref>

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q2699893 Hyloscirtus Amphibians of Costa Rica Amphibians of Panama Amphibians described in 1931 Taxonomy articles created by Polbot