The advertisement call of Espadarana prosoblepon (Anura: Centrolenidae) from a population in the Central Andes of Colombia

Abstract

The advertisement call of the glass frog Espadarana prosoblepon has been described for populations from Costa Rica in Central America and Ecuador in South America, but not for populations in Colombia. Because having a detailed description of the advertisement call of several populations of the same species is important for taxonomy, phylogenetics, ecology, behavior, and evolution, we describe the advertisement call of a population of E. prosoblepon in Colombia, South America. We analyzed 58 temporal and spectral features of 220 advertisement calls emitted by 31 males recorded between October-December 2023 at the “Cedro Rosado” Botanical Garden in Armenia, Department of Quindío, Central Andes of Colombia. In general, the advertisement call of E. prosoblepon in our study population consisted of 2-4 pulsed notes (beeps) with modulated frequency. The mean duration of the call was 230 ms (range 190-430 ms) and of the notes was 40.1 ms (31.0-48.7 ms), separated by intervals of 143.5 ms (71.5-181 ms). The dominant frequency of the call was 5.2 kHz (4.9-5.6 kHz). Our results suggest slight differences in note duration between the studied population in Colombia and populations of E. prosoblepon in Costa Rica and Ecuador. Further studies are necessary to test for potential effects of temperature and body size on call features both at the intra- and interpopulation levels. Given the wide latitudinal and altitudinal geographic distribution of E. prosoblepon, intraspecific geographic variation in its call is possible.