All tailless amphibians are considered predators. But in the vicinity of the state of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, there lives a tree frog, strange by frog standards, Xenohyla truncata. The frog is small - 4.5 cm and feeds on the fruits of plants.
Unfortunately, to confirm the fact of vegetarianism, you need to examine the gastrointestinal tract of a frog, and scientists caught them for two years every month, as a result they had to study several hundred individuals.
Apparently, the poor tree frogs did not lose their lives in vain in the name of science, as scientists have found that the frog periodically becomes a vegetarian and eats the fruits of erythroxylum, and sometimes is on a mixed diet.
Scientists did not find any seasonality in the choice of food (as evidenced by the table shown in the photo). Xenochila can eat both exclusively habitual food - larvae and adult arthropods, and plant food, not paying attention to the season. The diet of plants includes mainly the fruits of erythroxylum (Erythroxylum ovalifolium), the frog also feeds on fruit pods and seeds of anthurium (Anthurium harrisii), seeds of eriogonum (Eriogonum ovalifolium), fruits of mautenus (Maytenus obtusifolia).
Xenochila lives in the leaves of a small neoregelia shrub (Neoregelia cruenta) and, like many other frogs, hides during the day and is active at night. Moreover, another species of xenohyla, Xenohyla eugenioi, does not feed on plant foods and, like all decent frogs, feeds only on animal food. It is not clear why Xenohyla truncata switches to a plant-based diet entirely.
Obviously, the frog uses the fruit as a supplement, but why completely switch to it? According to one hypothesis, the fruits are used as a source of toxins. The fruits of some types of erythroxylum contain alkaloids and terpenes. Our "vegan" uses toxins for protection, such as poison dart frogs. But the hypothesis has not yet been confirmed. It is also unclear how Xenohyla truncata finds these fruits. Frogs react to moving objects, while the fruits of erythroxylum are motionless. Whether the frog distinguishes colors or reacts to some other factors in order to distinguish the fruits it needs is also unclear. Here is such a mysterious frog-vegetarian.
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