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Forget tadpoles, newly discovered toads take a shortcut and birth live ‘toadlets’

The discovery not only adds to our understanding of amphibians but also highlights the need to protect the fragile environment these live-bearing toads depend on.

2 min readNew DelhiDec 10, 2025 01:26 PM IST

Normally, frogs and toads lay eggs that hatch into tadpoles (Representational Image: Envato)

Scientists have recently discovered three new species of toads in Tanzania that do something very rare— give birth to live baby toads called “toadlets,” skipping the usual tadpole stage. Typically, frogs and toads lay eggs that hatch into tadpoles, which then grow into adult frogs or toads. But these toads, which belong to a group called Nectophrynoides or “tree toads,” are special because they don’t go through a tadpole phase at all.

Before this discovery, only 17 out of over 7,000 known frog and toad species were known to give birth to live young, and 13 of those were from the same Nectophrynoides group. These three newly identified species—Nectophrynoides saliensis, Nectophrynoides luhomeroensis, and Nectophrynoides uhehe—were found during a detailed study of toads in the Eastern Arc Mountains of Tanzania. Scientists studied hundreds of preserved toad specimens, recorded toad calls in the wild. They even analysed their DNA to tell apart these new species from the one previously known as Nectophrynoides viviparus.

Although the new species look similar to Nectophrynoides viviparus, slight differences in their genes, head shapes, and body gland positions helped scientists identify them as separate species. This discovery showed that what was once thought to be a single common species was actually four distinct species, with much smaller groups living in fragmented habitats.

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This finding is important for conservation because the smaller, scattered homes of these toads might make them more at risk than previously believed. One related species, Nectophrynoides asperginis, sadly went extinct in the wild in 2009 because of a fungal disease and a dam construction nearby.

John Lyakurwa, a biologist at the University of Dar es Salaam, said, “The forests where these toads live are disappearing quickly,” underscoring that human activities and climate change threaten these rare toads’ habitats.

The discovery not only adds to our understanding of amphibians but also highlights the need to protect the fragile environment these live-bearing toads depend on. Scientists hope future research will help determine how endangered each species is and guide efforts to conserve them.

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