Telmatobius frogs, famous for their wrinkled appearance, are semi-aquatic or aquatic frogs that live at relatively high altitudes in the Andean regions of South America and are of extreme conservation concern due to habitat loss, infectious diseases (e.g., chytrid), and human predation (species in this group are believed to have medicinal properties and are regularly sold for consumption). A recent report on the ecology and evolution of parental care, Brunetti et al (2025) made observations of multiple species (T. culeus, T. hintoni, T. intermedius, T. jelskyii, and T. oxycephalus) in both the field and the lab. The most extensive observations (both intensity and duration) were made on wild and captive T. culeus from Lake Titicaca. They found that all these species exhibit male parental care in the form of clutch attendance and guarding (e.g. attacks on other individuals approaching the clutch). Given that the studied species are distributed widely across the phylogeny of Telmatobius, this suggests that parental care of aquatic eggs is likely a primitive trait within this clade. Their observations revealed several interesting aspects of parental care in these frogs. The authors were able to observe mating and oviposition in both the field and lab in several species. They found that eggs were attached to substrates (e.g. rocks or vegetation) underwater in each of the species. Several stream-breeding species were nocturnal, active only at night, whereas T. culeus from Lake Titicaca were active both day and night. The males frequently vocalized, and T. hintoni and T. oxycephalus males engaged in territorial aggression above and beyond the aggression associated with clutch guarding. The authors suggest that possibly territoriality and and parental care are linked to mating success in male Telmatobius (as in other taxa), but further research is needed to confirm or refute this.

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