They are commonly heard calling from dense grassy areas after heavy rains. Their call is a rapid "pip-pip-pip" repeated over and over again. They generally call from underneath tangles of grass and vegetation. The individual above was photographed after being carefully dug out of the dense tangle of grasses where he was calling. Here is a series of the rapid "pip" calls from the southern slopes of El Yunque on the main island of Puerto Rico. These are the calls of the frog shown in the photo above.
The Red-eyed Coqui (Eleutherodactylus antillensis) is one of a confusing group of small frogs found in Puerto Rico. The Red-eyed Coqui occurs in Puerto Rico and the British and US Virgin Islands.
Its call is best described as a sharp "ta-deek". It almost sounds like the highly amplified sound of water dripping. Here is a Red-eyed Coqui calling in the El Yunque area of the main island of Puerto Rico.
In the background of the previous recording, you can hear the upward "fingernail-over-the-comb" type trill similar to the call of some of North American chorus frogs in the genus Pseudacris. The speed of the trill can also vary. Here is another group of E. antillensis from El Yunque doing the trill along with the "ta-deek" call, but this time the trill is much slower.
Here is an E. antillensis from the Puerto Rican Island of Culebra making its "ta-deek" call followed by short trill then some more "ta-deek" calls.
And here is another pair of males calling from Isla Culebra.
Although these "Red-eyed" Coquis I recorded on Culebra, PR sounded just like the species on the main island, they didn't have the red eyes of the mainland population. The striped pattern seen here is variable and apparently several species of Puerto Rican Eleutherodactylus can have this pattern. I assume they are the same species as the mainland population, but it is hard to be sure in this confusing group of frogs.
Eleutherodactlys cf. cochranae
Naguabo, Puerto Rico
There area a variety of endemic species of the genus found on the island of Puerto Rico. They are mostly small frogs and are very similar looking. However, they have different calls which makes them somewhat easier to distinguish. While recording frogs on the south side of the El Yunque National Forest, I recorded several of these other species although I did not seen the frogs themselves as they called from long grass or densely wooded areas. The Grass Coqui (Eleutherodactylus brittoni) is restricted to the main island of Puerto Rico. Its call is best described as a high-pitched "ti-dik" or "ti-dik-dik". The call can include more than three syllables producing a cricket-like trill. Here are a couple of recordings of the Grass Coqui from El Yunque -
In this second recording, you can hear the frogs chain together more syllables creating an almost cricket-like trill. The lower pitched "ta-deek" is the Red-eyed Coqui (Eleutherodactylus antillensis).
Another small species of Coqui found only on Puerto Rico is the Whistling Coqui (Eleutherodactylus cochranae). As the name implies, the call of this species is a high-pitched (~4KHz) nasal whistling sound. Here are a couple of recordings of Whistling Coquis from the same area.
The small coqui in the photo above was found on the road near where these E. cochranae were recorded and appears to be a young individual of that species.
EDIT - I am now officially even more confused about these two species. I think this one maybe E. coqui and my photos of "E. coqui" in that species blog post may be E. portoricensis. Looks like I need to make another trip to Puerto Rico! I thought this frog is the Upland Coqui (Eleutherodactylus portoricensis) It is very similar to the Coqui (Eleutherodactylus coqui). Both species occur in the area I photographed and recorded this frog. Their calls are also rather similar. The two species are similar enough that for many years they were both regarded as the same species of frog. The Upland Coqui has a higher pitched call which is most easily heard in the "qui" note of the call. (See my note from 2023 below explaining that difference further - it isn't the pitch difference that is as important as the interval difference). This is from the lowlands between the El Yunque Rainforest and the town of Naguabo. It had rained very heavily that afternoon and thousands of frogs were calling along the Rio Blanco river floodplain and forest edge. Although this frog was not recorded in the highlands, I still believe it to be Eleutherodactylus portoricensis. (If anyone knows any different, please leave a comment!)
This is the recording from the frog picture above calling near El Yunque.
2023 update - I've been listening to these recordings again (and again). I think this is E. coqui instead. In doing a bunch of comparisons online, I think the difference between the two is the distance between the frequencies of their calls. E. portoricensis has the two parts of the call closer in pitch, E. coqui further. From the playing around I have done, it appears:
E. portoricensis only goes up ~8 semitones between the co and the -qui (an Augmented 5th for those musically inclined).
E. coqui goes up ~10 semitones between the two parts (a minor 7th - almost an octave). I have created a silly comparison using generated tones that I will upload in the future.
The Coqui (Eleutherodactyls coqui) is an iconic symbol of the Puerto Rican night. All across the country, this species (or the very similar Eleutherodactylus portoricensis) can be heard calling from forest, fields and gardens at night. Although endemic to Puerto Rico, this frog has been introduced to several other areas of the world including Florida and Hawaii in the US.
Their call gives this group of frogs their common name. The call is a loud, piercing "co-ki" (spelled "co-qui" by the spanish speaking people of Puerto Rico). This group of Coqui were recorded on the southern slopes of El Yunque along the Rio Blanco.
This next individual was recorded outside our hotel room at Casa Cubuy on the southern slopes of the El Yunque National Forest. In this recording, we hear the Coqui add an extra syllable to the call, making a "co-qui-qui" call.
