hear call (264.1K MP3 file)
	hear call (242.5K MP3 file)

	hear Fonozoo call
[call details here]

Description
A very small terrestrial microhylid; males 10-12 mm, one gravid female measured 11 mm with a weight of less than 0.2 g. Back light brown, with some small dispersed black patches. The upper jaw is usually with dark pigmentation. Venter greyish. Skin on the back is smooth. Tympanum distinct, tympanum/eye ratio is 1/3 - 2/5. Tibiotarsal articulation reaches the tympanum. Four fingers, the inner finger reduced, and 5 toes, the inner toe reduced. Males with a distinct, largely distensible, single subgular vocal sac (Glaw and Vences 2007).

Similar species: Stumpffia tridactyla has extremely reduced fingers and toes. Other Stumpffia are larger with longer hindlimbs (Glaw and Venecs 2007).

Distribution and Habitat

Country distribution from AmphibiaWeb's database: Madagascar

View distribution map in BerkeleyMapper.

Species is located in Nosy Be, Nosy Komba, Lokobe (Glaw and Vences 2007) from sea level up to 300 m asl (Vences and Andreone 2008).

Life History, Abundance, Activity, and Special Behaviors
Habits: At Nosy Be, common in the leaf litter of secondary and primary forest, ylang-ylang cultivations and on road verges. Males call mainly in the late afternoon until sunset, during rainy weather also at night. One specimen, captured as adult, lived 3.5 years in a vivarium. In captivity, several foam nests were found which did not contain eggs but were guarded by calling males. In contrast to other foam-nest building frogs, in which the foam is produced during the amplexus, just before egg deposition, the foam nests of Stumpffia are possibly built only by the male. Three foam-nests were found, on 21 February 1992, in leaves on the forest floor. One contained 7 tadpoles and 5 embryos, another 8 tadpoles and 5 embryos and the third 4 tadpoles in stage 42. The tadpoles had a maximum total length of 8 mm. One of these tadpoles developed within 1.5 days into a froglet measuring less than 3 mm (SVL). To our knowledge this is the smallest known frog specimen in the world (Glaw and Vences 2007).

Calls: Regular series of chirping notes of high frequency (Glaw and Vences 2007).

Trends and Threats
Species is listed as vulnerable because it is known from only two locations (Vences and Andreone 2008).

Major Threats: High human population density and urbanization on the islands of Nosy Be and Nosy Komba are undoubtedly contributing to a reduction in the availability of suitable habitat. Any factors resulting in the loss of humid leaf-litter, such as expanding sugarcane cultivation, will be very detrimental for this species. Other possible threats include fires and pollution from agricultural pesticides (Vences and Andreone 2008).

Conservation Actions: It occurs in R�serve Naturelle Int�grale de Lokobe on Nosy Be. There is a need for close population monitoring of this species given its very limited range (Vences and Andreone 2008).

Possible reasons for amphibian decline

General habitat alteration and loss
Intensified agriculture or grazing
Urbanization
Local pesticides, fertilizers, and pollutants

Comments
Taken with permission from Glaw and Vences (2007) and Vences and Andreone (2008).

References

Glaw, F., and Vences, M. (2007). Field Guide to the Amphibians and Reptiles of Madagascar. Third Edition. Vences and Glaw Verlag, Köln.

Vences, M. and Andreone, F. (2008). Stumpffia pygmaea. In: IUCN 2008. 2008 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. www.iucnredlist.org. Downloaded on 22 April 2009.

Species Account Citation: AmphibiaWeb 2010 Stumpffia pygmaea <https://amphibiaweb.org/species/2364> University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA. Accessed Nov 26, 2024.

Citation: AmphibiaWeb. 2024. <https://amphibiaweb.org> University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA. Accessed 26 Nov 2024.

AmphibiaWeb's policy on data use.