A large species of frog reaching up to 7 cm in body length. It has a brown or reddish-brown back, sometimes with darker patches. There is often a black stripe from the tip of the snout to the arm, becoming patches on the sides. The belly is white. The pupil is horizontal, and the iris is gold in the upper half and dark brown in the lower half. Fingers are unwebbed and toes are three-quarters webbed, both with small discs. Breeding males can be uniform bright yellow, or brown with yellow on the side and limbs only. Males are also significantly smaller than females, reaching up to only 5 cm in body length.
Eggs are laid as a single cluster under the water and attached to rocks in stream pools, or laid in shallow water-filled nests dug in sandy creek banks. Tadpoles can reach a total length of up to 4.5 cm, and are brown in colour with small gold spots. They often remain on the bottom of water bodies, and take around one and a half to three months to develop into frogs. Breeds during spring to summer and sometimes autumn.
Looks very similar to Litoria wilcoxii in its distribution. DNA testing is needed to distinguish these two species, although their distribution is mostly different.
Photo: Jodi Rowley
Photo: Jodi Rowley
By: Dave Stewart
By: Justin McMahon
Found in the Wet Tropics region from Cooktown south to Innisfail, and the Eungella Plateau, QLD.