Reptile & Amphibian Forums

This is my "american" tree Frog. He/she is very cute, and has kind of tamed down. I don't handle it often, but when I did, it was to clean the cage. At first it would jump everywhere. Not anymore.
I have a few questions. First, can frogs hear? Can they hear sounds? Or only high freqencies? Also -what is smarter; a frog or a Python? I've tried to compare the intelligence, but its next to impossible. I can't find that kind of info on Frogs...only how to keep them.
PS -How is a tree Frogs vision? Can they see in color? Can they recognize people? These kinds of questions go unanswered for so long..
Thanks
John

I can answer about the sound. Think about it, if they couldn't hear, would the males make those calls that sounds liek dogs barking to attract females? Yes, they can hear.
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P. sauvagei
derekb15.tripod.com/tropicaltreasures

I figured that out after I posted! But I'm still wondering if they can hear whole tones, like me speaking, or my record player in my room. Im more interested in their sight though.
thanks
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"Mint 9 Dimaggio? Im sorry You got four minutes because thats, Thats, THATS ABSOLUTELY LUDICROUSSS"
-Don West

Yes frogs can hear. They have a pretty sophisticated hearing system, actually. They have developed tympanums (the round thing behind the eyes) used for day to day hearing. They can also "hear" w/ their legs, as their front legs can relay sound waves to the head. This is a carry-over from being fish and it is used primarly to sense danger, or so I hear.
As for the vision...
Frogs and salamanders have fairly well developed vision. In fact, they have green rods in the retina, for which the function is unknown!

As for intelligence...
Is a tree frog more intelligent than a python? I would say "no" although behavior tests are difficult to conduct on animals w/ animal intelligence. I would bet that the python is more "intelligent", however the difference is probably so small that you will not be able to tell the difference w/ behavioral tests.
Basically, your tree frog is not going to do tricks They can be conditioned, as any animal can, and they will 'know' when it's feeding time if you consistently do something before feeding(even if it's just stand in front of the cage or something you do anyway).
HOpe this helped.
Ben

I am going to recommend a book for you, A Natural History of Amphibians, by Stebbins and Cohen. The price has come down recently and it is under $20. This provides scientific but easy to read information about amphibians.

I was planning on ignoring the intelligence question, but Ben got me thinking. I'm going to venture and say that tree frogs are probably more intelligent than a python. For one, snakes are known for being incredibly instinctive, relying on the most basic behaviors for survival and not beeing good at adapting them. Tree frogs on the other hand, have to deal with a lot in their environment that snakes do not. For one thing there is jumping. The tree frogs must have very good binocular vision in order to judge distance and depth. They must be able to coordinate a jump to land it successfully, but also be able to factor in the variability of a moving prey that can defend itself.

Frogs in general also display very complex social behaviors, especially when it comes to calling males. Females are able to figure out from a males call their relative age, size, health, and distance. Males on the other hand are capable of making their calls more complex when competition is high. In fact there is one tropical species that is capable of inserting his call into a space of other males calls even when it is only one one-thousanth of a second long and is completely random! You have to admit that takes quite a bit of brain work to be able to react that fast!! Many frogs are territorial and get into combat as well further increasing the social complexity.

I had difficult funding parallels with snakes, especially dumb ones like pythons!
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*Humans aren't the only species on earth... we just act like it.

".the oldest task in human history: to live on a piece of land without
spoiling it."
Aldo Leopold (1938)

it has been a long going debate whether frogs can hear all sound all only there on frequency.

some people think they can only here the on frequency of the male of the same species calling. this is why when u mimic their call they reply, because they think you are another male from their species wanting to compete/ mate.

luke z