Pet poison dart frogs

[Tom Highum]

Actually I think they now believe that they get the poison from beetles. And about the ground for breeding bacteria thing. I believe some frogs have skin secretions that actually fight bacteria and parasites. I believe white's do this.

[Ron]

Actually I think they now believe that they get the poison from beetles.

That's interesting, Tom...I had not heard this. Do you have any references to studies or literature regarding beetles as a source?

[Tom Highum]

I will try to find it.

[John]

I have a vague recollection of reading a journal article that surveyed the arthropods in the habitat and found low levels of the the toxins in question in ants (and perhaps something else). That's going back through my memory about 8 years though.

[Tom Highum]

Melyrid beetles (Choresine): A putative source for the batrachotoxin alkaloids found in poison-dart frogs and toxic passerine birds — PNAS John what do you think about this? I think (didn't read the whole thing and most of it was over my head) it is mainly about Phyllobates terribilis

[Ron]

I will give that a read Tom, thanks. I know they have done some studies that show Dendrobatids to be quite "plastic" in their ability to sequester toxins, and that the types of toxins found in the frogs are pretty reflective of the toxins found in the inverts and microinverts of the place. For instance, frogs of species X in one valley tend to have alkaloids representative of the insects in that valley...and frogs of species X in a seperate valley tend to have alkaloids representative of that specific valley. Given that inverts and microinverts are consuming the alkaloids from the plants of each valley, and the frogs are then consuming the inverts...it makes sense. Makes one rather cautious about feeding field sweepings to certain species...

[John]

That's because that species is the one that was used for poison darts. It's dangerous to even touch wild caught Phyllobates terribilis. On the other side of things, they're very tame captives (you'll see what I mean in the last 5 seconds of this video):

YouTube - Jumping Phyllobates terribilis "mint"

[Tom Highum]

Hmm Ok did you read the article? I found it kinda interesting.

[Ron]

I did, and I definitely understand species of Phyllobates uptaking the alkaloids through different species of beetles. But for many of the other Dendrobatid species, most of their diets (based upon gut contents) consist of ants and oribatid mites. I don't have the references on hand, but the studies I'm referring to were with O. pumilio I believe.

And I hope it doesn't seem as though I'm arguing...I'm not at all. The possible ways and sources by which they can uptake and sequester alkaloids is pretty impressive.