After our van-load of herpers had pulled over to admire a caiman's biting prowess, Mike Pingleton had moved on to admire some smaller, less dangerous species, including a number of these pretty little tree frogs that were calling in a nearby marshy area. I joined him for a good twenty minutes of frog-spotting.

Here is a complete list of the herps I saw in the wild on my 2013 MT Amazon Expeditions trip.

This species is, true to its English name, extremely variable in pattern and coloration.

The pond/reservoir behind the Santa Cruz field station has a thriving colony of these attractive frogs.

Here are a couple more from around the Santa Cruz pond.

Back at the pond at the Santa Cruz field station, the treefrogs were busy, as they were last year. Some were calling, and at least this last one was gobbling down a katydid (based on the length of the antennae).

Here is a complete list of the herps I saw in the wild on my 2014 MT Amazon Expeditions trip.

I went looking for interesting-looking Dendropsophus triangulum around the Santa Cruz pond, and found these four.

On this rainy night, the Variable Clown Treefrogs were busy calling for mates, finding mates, and just hanging around.

Surprisingly, I didn't see any of this species around the pond at the field station, which is where I have typically seen many. But at another pond a couple of miles down a trail, I saw a healthy population.