Common Name: Common Dink Frog, Tink Frog, or Caretta Robber Frog
Scientific Name: Diasporus diastema
Family: Eleutherodactylidae – Direct Developing Frog family
Location: Costa Rica, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama
Female Size: 0.95 inches (24 mm)
Male Size: 0.83 inches (21 mm)
The Common Dink Frog or Tink Frog is named after the sound of their call that sounds like a metallic tapping like a tink or dink. They spend most of their time above the ground.
The male Common Dink Frog calls from leaf piles of the forest floor to all the way up to the top of the rainforest canopy. Interested female frogs will show up and nudge the male frog to show that they are interested. Next, the male frog leads the female frog to a nesting spot such as the bromeliad axil, small hole in a tree, or in a pile of leaves. The female frog lays up to 20 eggs but generally less. Once the eggs are laid, the parents leave, providing no parental care for their offspring. Once the eggs hatch, tiny froglets come out. They skip a free living larval phase, making them a direct developing species like all members of the family Eleutherodactylidae.
The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List assesses the Common Dink Frog as Least Concern for Extinction. They have a large range, spanning half of Central America. Also, they are numerous throughout that range. Additionally, the Common Dink Frog doesn’t mind modified habitat.