A frog smaller than a pencil eraser has hopped into the record books as the one of the smallest vertebrates known to science. Researchers formally described the species in late October 2024 after encountering it in the Atlantic Forest in southeastern Brazil’s São Paulo state. At a length of 6.95 millimeters (0.27 inches), Brachycephalus dacnis has given scientists a new appreciation of just how small vertebrates can get. The only known frog smaller than this, found in February 2024 in northeastern Brazil, beats it by just 0.5 mm (0.02 in) but struggles with balance. Frogs in the tiny Brachycephalus genus are notorious for their clumsy landings, often tumbling over or falling on their heads after jumping, as their vestibular systems were compromised in their evolution to be small. But the B. dacnis retained its inner ear structure, allowing it to hear and leap quite proficiently. Researchers found that it can jump an impressive 32 times its own size, with surprising grace. “The size makes this frog very special,” Edelcio Muscat, one of the researchers who described B. dacnis and a coordinator at Projeto Dacnis, a conservation NGO working in the Atlantic Forest, told Mongabay by phone. “The miniaturization process hasn’t affected any of its organs or its skeleton.” In 2016, Muscat was on a typical nighttime expedition carefully turning over leaves on the forest floor when one of the frogs jumped out. Recordings of its croak, more akin to a cricket’s chirp than a typical toad’s ribbit, would confirm it…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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South Africa Today – Environment
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