Ghost Frogs: Heleophrynidae - Physical Characteristics, Behavior And Reproduction, Conservation Status, Natal Ghost Frog (heleophryne Natalensis): Species Account - GEOGRAPHIC RANGE, HABITAT, DIET, GHOST FROGS AND PEOPLE
mountains drakensberg africa found
Ghost frogs live in and around South Africa's Drakensberg Mountains, where some of the world's highest waterfalls are found.
The ghost frogs may make their homes among the forests and sometimes grasslands of the Drakensberg mountain range, which are the highest mountains in South Africa. They can be found from sea level up the mountains' steep slopes to 9,843 feet (3,000 meters), but usually in an area with a swift, rocky river or stream, which is where they mate and have their young.
The adult diet includes various insects, snails, and other invertebrates (in-VER-teh-brehts), or animals with no backbone, as well as smaller frogs. They apparently are not cannibalistic (can-ih-bull-ISS-tik), which means that they do not eat members of their own species. The tadpoles are vegetarians and eat algae (AL-jee) that they scrape off underwater rocks. Algae are plantlike growths that live in water but have no true roots, leaves, or stems.
People rarely see these frogs.
Additional Topics
With colors and patterns that almost perfectly match the forest floor where they live, the ghost frogs live up to their name and, when they are very still, seem to vanish into the background. The Cape ghost frog, also known as Purcell's ghost frog, has a brown back and head that are covered with black blotches—almost as if someone had shaken out a wet paintbrush and splattered black …
During the day, they hide from sight under or between rocks, or in cracks within rocks. Their flattened bodies help them to squeeze into even small openings. At night, they hop out to look for food. Their sticky, wide front and back toe tips help them to climb easily up even the wet and slippery sides of streamside rocks. Predators often do not see these camouflaged frogs, but even when they do, t…
According to the World Conservation Union (IUCN), two of the six species are Critically Endangered, which means that they face an extremely high risk of extinction in the wild. One is Hewitt's ghost frog, which lives in and around four streams about 1,310 to 1,805 feet (400 to 550 meters) above sea level in the Elandsberg mountains of South Africa's Eastern Cape Province. The frog br…
Physical characteristics: The Natal ghost frog has a brown to black head and back with yellowish to green blotches, and a lighter colored underside with markings on its throat. Like other ghost frogs, its body is flattened a bit, and it has small triangular-shaped pads on the tips of its front and back toes. Its large, bulging eyes have vertical, cat-like pupils. Geographic range: It lives in the …
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about 4 years ago
Fond memories of Richard Boycott and me spending a 4 day weekend in the Cederberg, looking for the elusive Ghostfrog, about 1970. We were both poor students and on the last hour of the last day R. yelled; ''I got one!!''At the time it was the most northern find and nobody was exactly sure if it was a new species, if all ghostfrogs were variants of the same species or if there were more further East or West or even which were male or female or where they disapeared to some months of the year.