Whispering to the deaf: communication by a frog without external vocal sac or tympanum in noisy environments.

ABSTRACT: Atelopus franciscus is a diurnal bufonid frog that lives in South-American tropical rain forests. As in many other frogs, males produce calls to defend their territories and attract females. However, this species is a so-called "earless" frog lacking an external tympanum and is thus anatomically deaf. Moreover, A. franciscus has no external vocal sac and lives in a sound constraining environment along river banks where it competes with other calling frogs. Despite these constraints, male A. franciscus reply acoustically to the calls of conspecifics in the field. To resolve this apparent paradox, we studied the vocal apparatus and middle-ear, analysed signal content of the calls, examined sound and signal content propagation in its natural habitat, and performed playback experiments. We sho

SUBMITTER: Boistel R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3135622 | biostudies-literature | 2011

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature