Malabar Gliding Frog

Fascinating facts about the Malabar Gliding Frog

• A single leap can carry this tree-dweller 9–12 m through the air – that's about 115 times its own 10-cm body length, turning a fall into a controlled glide. It shows how webbed feet can act like natural parachutes, letting a tiny amphibian cover the distance a human would need a short flight to cross.
• During monsoon breeding (June-September), a male will build a foam nest up to 112 mm long and 79 mm wide, then step back while the female lays 89–206 eggs that are only 2.0–3.2 mm across. This tiny, off-white clutch drops its tadpoles straight into the water, revealing a precise hand-off strategy from air to stream.
• Found from 43 m to 1,894 m above sea level, the species thrives in primary forests, plantations, and even urban trees across five Indian states. Its wide altitude range proves the frog can adapt its gliding and breeding habits to very different climates and habitats.
• The frog’s orange-red webbing stretches between its fingers and toes, while its toe-pad disks are as big as its eardrum, which measures about 60–70 % of the eye’s diameter. Such oversized surfaces give it the lift needed for those 9-meter glides, illustrating how body proportions can evolve for aerial mobility.

At a glance

About the Malabar Gliding Frog

The Malabar gliding frog (Rhacophorus malabaricus) is a striking arboreal amphibian of the Western Ghats, its vivid green back a seamless canvas of moss-like granulation, punctuated only by the bright orange-red webbing that stretches between its elongated toes. Measuring about 10 cm (4 in) from snout to vent, the species is among the largest moss frogs, with males modestly smaller than females. Its limbs are adorned with delicate skin fringes and a triangular heel extension, while the large toe pads, about the size of its tympanum, grant it a grip that seems engineered for the canopy. When leaping from treetops, the frog unfurls its webbed feet, turning a free-fall into a controlled glide that can span 9–12 m, roughly 115 times its body length, a feat that has earned it the moniker “gliding” frog. In the mist-laden forests and even in secondary growth, plantations, and urban green spaces of Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Goa and Maharashtra, the Malabar gliding frog dwells from 43 m to 1 894 m above sea level, perching on leaves over streams and riverbanks. Breeding erupts with the monsoon rains of June to September, when males call from stream edges and construct foam nests that hang from overhanging branches. Peripheral males assist in nest building, and after the female deposits 89–206 unpigmented eggs, the male departs, leaving the clutch to be covered in leaf litter. Upon hatching, the tadpoles plunge into the water below, continuing the species’ remarkable life cycle that bridges sky and stream.

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