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A teen H. yaku in its natural habitat: a black backdrop.
L. A. Coloma
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Good luck studying glassfrogs. Even the largest ones are barely two inches long, they live only along secluded streams inside dense jungles, and their translucent green skin blends perfectly with the leaves they like to hide under. And just to make life even harder for biologists, some of them have completely transparent skin.
[post_ads]Such is the case for Hyalinobatrachium yaku, a newly discovered species from Ecuador. A group of biologists found these little guys (and gals) hiding out in three different areas in the Amazonian lowlands. They published their findings in the journal ZooKeys. Most glassfrogs don’t have transparent underbellies, and even fewer have completely exposed organs, but H. yaku leaves nothing to the imagination.
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Bet you weren't picturing its heart as white, were you? Glassfrogs have white coatings on their internal organs.
L. A. Coloma
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H. yaku faced both of those problems. The biologists who discovered it had to distinguish it from multiple species that had similar colorings, mating calls, and breeding areas. A combination of those three traits were enough to establish little yaku as its own unique group.
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No one is quite sure why some frogs have transparent skin like this. There’s no obvious evolutionary advantage and no clear biological function. Maybe they just took the issue of scientific transparency a bit too seriously?
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These are only slightly less interesting than those pictures of what cats look like from beneath.
L. A. Coloma
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