Critically Endangered
Platymantis insulatus
Platymantis insulatus
Platymantis insulatus is a frog in the family Ceratobatrachidae (order Anura), recorded as Critically Endangered.
Appearance
Adult males measure 38–42 mm (1.5–1.7 in) and adult females 40–46 mm (1.6–1.8 in) in snout–vent length. The head is relatively narrow and the snout is rounded-pointed. Preserved individuals are dorsally grayish olive green to live-brown. The lighter-shaded specimens are heavily mottled with large, irregular, brownish or dark blotches.
Range and habitat
It is endemic to the Gigante Islands just northeast of Panay, the Philippines. This frog is variously known as the Gigantes wrinkled ground frog, island forest frog, South Gigante Island frog, Gigantes forest frog, and Gigantes limestone frog. Originally described from South Gigante, it is now known to occur on at least three other islands.
Platymantis insulatus is common on all four islands it inhabits, and it is abundant when the weather is appropriate (during heavy rains). Even so, the islands are experiencing habitat loss and deterioration.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Breeding
Calling males and egg sites define most frog field work. A species known from one ridge is as narrow as it sounds.
Eggs and damp skin make amphibians quick to vanish from a drained wetland or a forest stripped of litter.
In crisis
Development is direct (i.e., there is no free-living larval stage), with individual fecundity up to 48 eggs. In particular, guano mining and the quarrying of limestone are likely to harm the habitat of this species, and the populations are believed to be declining.
Chytrid fungus, collection, and wet-forest loss are the usual pressures on frogs with a high threat category.
Platymantis insulatus is Critically Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Platymantis insulatus, Wikidata item Q2244532. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
