Right:  A female individual of an as yet undescribed species of rocket frog, genus Colostethus , from the Pen'nsula de Paria in northeastern Venezuela. These frogs are closely related to the colorful poison frogs; we may call them the drab cousins.

Right:  A male of the Caribbean frog Eleutherodactylus johnstonei . These frogs are extremely adaptable, which has made them one of the frogs with the widest distribution in the Americas. Although its origin is in the northern Lesser Antilles, this frog has been carried all over the Caribbean and northern South America, even living in a large greenhouse in England for some 30 years in the early 1900s.

An intimate hug of a male (on the back) and female of an as yet undescribed species of Eleutherodactylus . In frogs, such an embrace is the prelude to egg-laying and fertilization. In this species, the eggs are laid onto leaves or mosses, and one of the adults will return to keep them moist. After an incubation time of several weeks, small froglets will emerge from the eggsÑno tadpoles!

Right:  An egg-bearing female of the marsupial frog Flectonotus fitzgeraldi from northeastern Venezuela. Females in this species have skin folds on their backs that form pouches to keep the eggs with mom until the tadpoles are ready to hatch. This is a great advantage because the frog can protect the eggs from predators and from drying out.

Left:  This is a species of glass frog, genus Hyalinobatrachium , from northeastern Venezuela. These frogs are very well adapted to life on leaves. They will sit on the underside of leaves and become all but invisible by matching the color of the leaf. Some glass frogs even have greenish blood so that birds with infrared vision cannot see them. They are called glass frogs because their bellies are transparent, and one can clearly see the pumping heart.