Frog of the Week

Crowned Bullfrog (Hoplobatrachus occipitalis) 

Crowned Bullfrog
photo by Brian Gratwicke

Common Name: Crowned Bullfrog, African Groove-Crowned Bullfrog
Scientific Name: Hoplobatrachus occipitalis
Family: Dicroglossidae – Forked Tongue Frog family
Locations: Algeria, Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, and Zambia
Size: 2.6 – 5.3 inches (68 – 135 mm)

The Crowned Bullfrog lives in savannas and some forests in sub-Saharan Africa. Frogs start to move to temporary ponds once the rainy season starts and the ponds start filling up. The Crowned Bullfrog takes the phrase don’t store all your eggs in one basket to heart. The mating pair only deposits a few eggs per rock pool and move on to the next one to prevent all their offspring from being eaten by one predator or drying out.

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List assesses the Crowned Bullfrog as Least Concern for Extinction. They have a extremely wide range and are common throughout it. Overharvesting of the frogs is a problem for locale populations but overall, not a serious threat.

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