Posts in Category: frog
Costa Rica! Frog different
Rosenburg’s Tree Frog (?): Macaw Ranch, Sarapique, Costa Rica, December 2023 — Of course, the Red-eyed Leaf (or Tree) Frog is not the only amphibian of the Sarapique rainforest. We found this brown species in a bush near the ranch house at Macaw Ranch. Tree Frogs are very rare in the daylight. I think it might be a Rosenburg’s. OM System OM-1 with ED 100-400mm IS zoom at 800mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Photomator.
Costa Rica! More frogs
Red-eyed Leaf Frogs: Selva Verde Lodge and Reserve, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica, December 2023 — Part of what makes Red-eyed Leaf Frogs so much fun to photograph is the interesting poses they take and hold. We don’t pose them. This is the way we find them, caught in the act of being themselves. 🙂 OM System OM-1 with ED 100-400mm IS zoom at 800mm equivalent. Program mode with in-camera focus stacking. ISO 6400 and 2000. Processed in Photomator.
Costa Rica! Celebrity
Red-eyed Leaf Frog: Selva Verde Lodge and Reserve, Sarapiqui, Costa Rica, December 2023 — One of the “poster” species for Costa Rican conservation, the Red-eyed Leaf Frog, in its more colorful Caribbean slope variety. They are easy to find right at the foot of the stairs going up to the dining hall at Selva Verde. Flash is not allowed on the Selva Verde grounds, but the frogs do not seem disturbed by led flashlights and even small video lights, and they often sit in one spot for ten or fifteen minutes, so they are relatively easy to photograph. I always use a long lens with close focus so as to disturb them as little as possible. OM Systems OM-1 with ED 100-400mm zoom at 800mm equivalent. Program mode with my birds and wildlife modifications. ISO 6400 @ f6.3 @ 1/200th. -0.7EV. Processed in Photomator.
Costa Rica! The other Poison Dart Frog
Poison Dart Frog: Selva Verde Lodge and Reserve, Sarapique Valley, Costa Rica, December 2023 — The other Poison Dart Frog, a completely different species, from Selva Verde. This is the Strawberry or Blue-jeans Frog, a member of the Oophaga genus. There are many different color variations in the genus, from this bright red, through various oranges and yellows, spotted and patterned. The Blue-jeans is by far the most common. Again these shots at take in poor light at the full 800mm equivalent of the 100-400mm IS zoom with 2x digital tele-converter. OM Systems OM-1 in Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Photomator and Pixelmator Pro.
Costa Rica! Green and Black
Green and Black Poison Dart Frog: Selva Verde Lodge and Reserve, Sarapique Valley, Costa Rica, December 2023 — By the time we got to the frogs, we were, to be honest, already loosing the light, but you do what you must. It put a strain on the cameras…shooting at much higher ISO than any of us would have liked. Most people were working close with macro lenses…I was standing back and shooting at the long end of my zoom, 800mm equivalent, with the digital 2x extender engaged for 1600mm equivalent and a 1 to 1 image magnification…so a true telephoto macro. This is Dendrobates auratus, one of two poison dart frogs common on the grounds of Selva Verde Lodge. They are actually quite different species and only associated by their common name and the fact that both can be used to make the poison that was used on darts and arrows for hunting in the American tropics. This is the larger of the two species by quite a bit, and it is still less than 2 inches long. OM Systems OM-1 with ED 100-400mm IS zoom at 800mm x 2 digital for a 1600mm field of view. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Photomator.
Costa Rica! Focus stacked frog
Red-eyed Leaf Frog: Selva Verde Lodge, Sarapique Valley, Costa Rica — the poster child for Costa Rican conservation, the Red-eyed Leaf Frog (or Tree Frog) is one of the main attractions of Selva Verde Lodge. They have a healthy population right at the foot of the stairs leading up to the dinning hall. They are nocturnal and sensitive to flash so you have to photograph them with led movie lights or with flashlights. This year I got to try the OM Systems OM-1’s in-camera focus stacking…which takes 8 images and stacks them to get the whole frog in focus at the same time. Quite a trick. Especially working from my monopod beanbag. I cannot argue with the results though! Perhaps my best Red-eyed Leaf Frog shot to date. 🙂 As noted the OM Systems OM-1 with the ED 100-400mm IS zoom at 800mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications and in-camera focus stacking. Processed in Photomator.
Fleischmann’s Glass Frog
Fleischmann’s Glass Frog: Canopy Lodge, Panama, July 2022 — One of my favorite things to do in the tropics is to go out at night with a flashlight looking for frogs (and whatever else we find). I was particularly eager at the Canopy Lodge in Panama because Glass Frogs live on the property. I have seen a few different species of Glass Frogs in Costa Rica, but only when Cope has brought them in for photography at his place. I was hoping to encounter one “in the wild” in Panama. Tino, my guide at the Lodge, was pretty confident he could find me some around the ponds on the far side of the stream, and indeed he did…three individuals and a couple of egg clusters. Fleischmann’s Glass. Frog is one of the smaller Glass Frogs…at under one inch, the smallest I have seen so far. All Glass Frogs shelter on the underside of leaves in the rain and it had just stopped raining when we went out, so we did a lot of peaking under leaves. These were hiding along the small stream that runs out from the lower swimming pool/pond. The egg cluster was about 20 times as big as either frog. There are fertile eggs in the cluster, and infertile. The tadpoles first meal will be the infertile eggs. The call of this Glass Frog is a sharp “wheeet” and, as you can see from the inflated call sacks, they were calling almost continuously…trying to attract females and defending their small territories. Sony Rx10iv at 330mm to 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications and multi-frame noise reduction. Taken by the light of a led flashlight. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos.
Wood Frogs!
Wood Frogs: Kennebunk, Maine, USA — Let’s take a break from the exotic birds of Coast Rica to celebrate spring in southern Maine. The Wood Frogs are mating in every vernal pool between home and the beach, all down Brown Street…and I am sure in almost every still water in southern Maine. They seem particularly loud this year. Springs is coming in! Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with my custom birds and wildlife modifications. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. ISO 200-320 @ f4 @ 1/500th.
Red-eyed Leaf Frog
Red-eyed Leaf Frog: Danta Corcovado Lodge, Osa Peninsula, Costa Rica — I posted a comparison post a while back now, featuring the different varieties of the Red-eyed Leaf Frog found we found at Selva Verde Lodge in the Sarapique River Valley in the Caribbean lowlands, and the Red-eyed Leaf Frogs we found at Danta Corcovado Lodge on the Osa Peninsula in the Pacific lowlands. There are 5 species of Leaf Frog found in Costa Rica, but there are apparently at least 5 distinct color variations of the Red-eyed Leaf Frog. The one you see almost exclusively in photos, with orange feet and bright blue flank bars, is the variety we found on the Caribbean slope. This one on the Osa Peninsula, with greeny-grey feet and almost black and white flank bars, is “variety A” (according to my field guide). I find it interesting that I could only find a single reference to the color variations in the Red-eyed Leaf Frog in a google search, and that was in a scientific paper on variations in defense peptides in the skins of the species. All of the more accessible internet sources, from Wikipedia to National Geographic, picture and describe only the orange-footed variety. I can be forgiven then, for thinking, for a moment there, that this might be a separate species. 🙂 Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with wildlife modifications and multi-frame noise reduction. Taken by the light of a flashlight. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. Equivalent ISO 5000 @ f4 @ 1/500th.
Fitzinger’s Rain Frog (Robber Frog?)
I think this is a Fitzinger’s Rain Frog, aka Fitzinger’s Robber Frog. Danta Corcovado Lodge, Osa Peninsula, Costa Rica — Rain Frogs, often also called Robber Frogs, are common all over Costa Rica. Pinning down the exact species is best left to those who really know their amphibians…which is not me. This was the first critter we encountered on our “night walk” our second night at Danta Corcovado Lodge on the Osa Peninsula. Taken by the light of a flashlight, using multi-frame noise reduction on the Sony Rx10iv at 600mm equivalent. Program mode with wildlife modifications and multi-frame noise reduction. Processed in Pixelmator Photo and Apple Photos. Equivalent ISO 4000 @ f4 @ 1/500th.