Ansonia platysoma

Flat-bodied Slender Toad

                                           

Ansonia platysoma is a locally common toad of mid-elevation hills up to montane forest. This species is known from Kinabalu, Crocker Range, Gunung Mulu and Brunei. The specimens shown here were found in Mulu, Sarawak and Poring, Kinabalu, Sabah, respectively.

The toad is small in size. It is brown to olive in ground color. The warts on the back are rather smooth. The head is flat in profile and the snout is protruding.

Adults come to breed in clear rocky streams. Males call from vegetation in or along the stream. The tadpoles are medium sized and possess a sucker-type oral disk directed towards the substratum. The tail is relatively strong and long, but tail fins are low in the proximal half of the tail. Note the pigmentation pattern of the tadpole. Tadpole cling to rocks in the current and graze on rock overgrowth, particularly at night.