Romeo and Juliet the Sehuencas Water Frogs have had their first date and have already moved in together in Romeo’s aquarium. The two are getting along swimmingly and Romeo has even started calling again after giving up at the end of 2017. If all goes as planned, the pair will help establish a conservation breeding program at the Museo de Historia Natural Alcide d’Orbigny to save their species from extinction.
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In 2008, a team of biologists in Bolivia brought in from the field a single male Sehuencas Water Frog (Telmatobius yuracare), Romeo. They had hoped to create a conservation breeding program for the traditionally common species ahead of population crashes they were seeing with other frogs. Ten years later and GWC partner Alcide d’Orbigny Natural History Museum and other researchers had not been able to locate a single other individual Sehuencas Water Frog—male or female—until now. On an expedition to a Bolivian cloud forest at the end of 2018, GWC and the museum rediscovered the Sehuencas Water Frog in the wild, including Juliet. Romeo even had his own dating profile on Match in his pursuit of a mate.
Top photo: Robin Moore, GWC