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Over 100 Frog Species Discovered in Sri Lanka

Posted by timothy on from the look-but-don't-eat dept.

randomErr writes "An ecological treasure trove of brightly colored and diverse new frog species has been discovered on the tea-plantation-covered island of Sri Lanka. The discovery of more than a hundred new rain-forest species makes the country a new center of frog diversity and increases the urgency for protecting what little forest it retains."

1 of 33 comments (clear)

  1. Ambiguous Title. by Gaijin42 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The discovery of more than a hundred new rain-forest species...

    The new finding increases the island's previously known tree frog diversity more than fivefold to over 100 species.

    So did they find 100 species, or did they find a few more, bringing the Total to 100. They found at least five, because they talk about some later down, but shoddy reporting...

    Also, what exactly makes a species? Just because they look different doesn't mean they are a different species. White people look alot different from black people. Same species. Did they do DNA comparisons? How different is different?

    This reminds me of the Darwin thing with the birds on the island that gave him the idea of evolution. Most scientists say, if the birds in question weren't so "holy" because of darwin, they wouldn't be classified as different spiecies at all, because the differences are so minor.