Elizabeth Preston

And this is bad.

So they need to move those tadpoles as soon as they hatch to a pool of water.

And usually it's the dad frog who does this.

He will crouch down among the tadpoles, get them to wriggle up onto his back, and then he hops around and he transports them to a small pool of water, maybe a little bit of rainwater, cupped in a leaf, and then that's where they live.

But then among some of these poison frog species, the caretaking goes even further.

There's a species where the dad has to put each tadpole into its own little pool of water.

The reason is that the tadpoles are cannibals.

Speaking of snacking, they will eat each other if you put them with their siblings.

So he has to move them all to different pools.

And then he will go around every day.

He'll remember where those pools are.

He'll hop to each one.

And he'll get into the water and the tadpole does this little vibrating dance, which communicates hunger, or at least communicates that it wants a snack.

And so the dad, if he observes this and goes, I think it's hungry.

Okay.

He starts singing.

He calls to his mate and his mate hears this song and she hops over, but she doesn't take their word for it.

She gets in.

She observes the vibrating dance and she decides and she might go, no, you had enough.

Enough snacks already today.