Rhacophorus hoabinhensis: A new species of Flying Frog from northern Vietnam.

Flying Frogs of the genus Racophorus are found from Madagascar and Africa across India to Southeast Asia and Japan. They have long, strong toes connected by thick webbing, which they spread out while dropping from trees, allowing them to glide for considerable distances (they are not actually capable of true flight). They lay their eggs in foam nests in the treetops, the tadpoles dropping out when they hatch, and falling into water beneath.

In a paper published in the journal Asian Herpetological Research on 4 April 2017, Tao Thien Nguyen of the Vietnam National Museum of Nature and Graduate University of Science and Technology of the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, and the Kyoto University Museum at Kyoto University, Cuong The Pham and Truong Quang Nguyen of the Institute of Ecology and Biological Resources and Graduate University of Science and Technology of the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, Hoa Thi Ninh of the Hanoi National University of Education, and Thomas Ziegler of the AG Zoologischer Garten Köln, and Institute of Zoology at the University of Cologne, describe a new species of Flying Frog from Hoa Binh Province in northern Vietnam.

The new species is named Rhacophorus hoabinhensis, meaning 'from Hoa Binh'. The species is described from two specimens, both slightly over 30 mm in length, with greyish dorsal surfaces with dark brown mottling, and yellowish undersides with red on the hind limbs. The species was found in secondary karst forests made up off medium and small hardwoods mixed with shrubs and vines in the Hang Kia-Pa Co Nature Reserve, where they were found singing around a small pool on low branches roughly 1.2-1.5 m above the ground.

Rhacophorus hoabinhensis in its biotope in Hang Kia–Pa Co Nature Reserve, Hoa Binh Province, Vietnam. Nguyen et al. (2017).

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