Whistling Grass FrogLeptodactylus fuscus

Leptodactylus fuscus
Waller Field, Trinidad

The Whistling Grass Frog (Leptodactylus fuscus) is found in savannas habitats from Panama down into South America east of the Andes.  They are a grassland species that calls from flooded grassy marsh areas.  I photographed and first recorded these frogs in Trinidad on an abandoned airfield at the edge of the Aripo Savanna protected area.

The call of the Whistling Grass Frog is, as you can imagine, an upward slurred whistle.  It is probably best described as a whistled "wheep".  It is quite a piercing call and travels some distance.  The frogs call from flooded grassy areas.

Here is a single individual calling from a flooded roadside ditch in Bon Accord, Tobago.  It was the only individual of this species I heard here in spite of the fact that there were large choruses of Leptodactylus validus calling all around.

Here's a large chorus calling from the Aripo Savanna area where I photographed the individual shown above. (The downward whistled "whee-oo" you hear among the frogs are Common Pauraques - a type of nightjar - calling from near the frog chorus) -

Looking at the spectrogram of the individual from Tobago, you can see the single upward slurred nature of the call and the sharp "whip" to the end of the call.

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© Chris Harrison 2019