It is a new species of the genus Platymantis that we can find from the Philippines to New Guinea. These frogs are commonly known as ground frogs or forest frogs.
The new Platymantis species, called Platymantis navjoti , lives in the montane forests of the Leyte and Samar Islands in the eastern Philippines. The experts found them in two locations in the Nacolod mountain range in the southern region of Leyte Island and in the mountains around Ormoc in the northern part of the island. In addition, field studies recorded this species in the north-central part of Samar Island.
” Platymantis navjoti inhabits the lower to upper montane forest from 600 meters to 1000 meters in elevation,” the authors wrote in the journal Zootaxa.
This new species of forest frog is between 2.1 and 2.9 cm in length, bright iridescent emerald green in color with small, irregularly shaped white dots, evenly spaced on all dorsal surfaces of the head, body and legs. extremities.
” The new species is phenotypically and ecologically more similar to members of the Tirahanulap subgenus, a group of small-bodied tree frogs that inhabit the montane forests of the central and northern islands of the Philippine archipelago,” the researchers point out.
The discovery of Platymantis navjoti increases the known diversity of Philippine Platymantis frogs to 32 species.
Reference: Arvin C. Diesmos et al. 2020. A new forest frog of the genus Platymantis (Amphibia: Anura: Ceratobatrachidae: subgenus Tirahanulap) from Leyte and Samar islands, eastern Philippines. Zootaxa 4830 (3): 573-591; doi: 10.11646 / zootaxa.4830.3.6
