Shawn Harrington was good enough to let me visit his frog room in November. I came to acquire some of Shawn's "Gold" - the yellow race of the Golden Poison Dart Frog, Phyllobates terribilis. The true “poison” dart frog, this species comes from the rain forest of Colombia and is the origin of the name “poison dart”, now applied indiscriminately to all South and Central American Dendrobatid frogs. The English name is deceptive – the colour of this frog varies from population to population, from orange to metallic mint-green!

Here are some of Shawn's P. terribilis tadpoles, happily developing in a pond in their parents' terrarium:



And a younger individual:



And the proud parents wonder why we were disturbing their happy family:



I came away with 5 of their froglets. When newly metamorphosed, as mine were, they are mostly a dark green/black colour, with two yellow lines, one on either side of their back. As they grow, the yellow develops and gradually pushes out the black. Here is a froglet at about a month out of the water:



And here today, about 3.5 months out of the water, you can see the frog now has adult colouration:



And what about the metallic mint green variety? Well Ray Coderre has some, here's one that posed for a photo:



This species is the biggest dart frog known, and adults have been known to tackle adult crickets!