SPECIES: Assa wollumbin — Mount Wollumbin Hip-pocket Frog, Wollumbin Pouched Frog
CLASSIFICATION: Critically endangered
Are you in need of some intruige? We have just the species for you. The Wollumbin 'Hip-pocket' or Pouched Frog is a very small species of around 16mm in body length. Endemic to NSW, the Pouched Frog is found on one isolated mountain within the Woolumbin National Park.
Here's the rundown: this tiny frog can vary in colour - shades of orange and brown with darker v-shape patterns and markings on its back. Their fingers and toes are unwebbed and it's a species only formally recognised in 2021, with good reason. As well as being pint-sized, its camouflage has kept it well hidden.
And the intruige. The Pouched Frog has unconventional parental behaviours to say the least. Young tadpoles are 'carried' on the hips of the male frog and emerge as a fully formed small frog. And if the male has been busy in the breeding season, he even has the ability to carry young from different developmental stages at the same time. We might call that clever.