Golden Poison Dart Frog (mint) on leaf, Timbiquí, Colombia
There it is, the Timbiquí target and climax of our herping tour. The CEO of poison frogs.
This is the most poisoneous of frogs and likely the most poisonenous animal on the planet. A wild specimen such as this one on average carries 1 milligram of poison, which is enough to kill 10-20 people or 2 African elephants.
It is much larger than other poison frogs and also much more confident. It doesn't seem to make much effort at all to hide or escape, because why would it. A fitting movie quote:
"Paulie might have moved slow, but it was only because Paulie didn’t have to move for anybody."
Further, they are expert predators (near 100% hite rate on their tongue strikes), socially advanced, dedicated parents and highly intelligent.
We found 3 individuals where 2 were extensively photographed, a mint morph (this one) and a yellow morph. I'll be sharing a large amount of shots because it's an epic species that is rarely photographed in the wild. Plus, the 7 million mosquito bites we suffered through had to have some use.
"Phyllobates terribilis", the golden poison frog or the golden dart frog, is a poison dart frog endemic to the Pacific coast of Colombia. The optimal habitat of "P. terribilis" is the rainforest with high rain rates, altitude between 100–200 m, temperature of at least 26 °C, and relative humidity of 80–90%.
