Drawing parallels with other species, not naming names, the voices of female frogs are being drowned out by their much louder male counterparts – so much so we only know how 1.4% of the ladies actually sound.
New research out of Brazil's Universidade de São Paulo has shockingly found that of all the frog species known to scientists, we barely know the vocalizations of any females. Essentially 98.6% of female frog calls are a mystery.
Naturally, there is a reason why the boys are louder – it's a key role in attracting mates and outcompeting other males. And female frogs are known to make softer and quieter sounds.
That said, the females have also developed some interesting techniques to challenge the boys, so perhaps vocal adaptation may also be in their future.
However, being able to hear females, in the context of nearby males, is vital to better understanding frog communication. And apart from listening in to their social chatter, having knowledge about how they communicate is an important tool in conserving species and helping to repopulate areas where sex imbalances hamper reproduction and therefore populations.
"We found reports of female calls in over 100 anuran species across 29 families, yet most studies are anecdotal and rarely explore their function," noted the researchers. "We summarize existing knowledge, propose a standardized classification, and identify key challenges. This work aims to correct the male-biased perspective in frog bioacoustics and to improve our understanding of communication, mating behaviors, and evolution in amphibians – encouraging a more balanced understanding of both sexes."
While it's, of course, impossible to tell the males to pipe down and let the girls speak, the research calls for developing better ways to detect female sounds – most likely through advances in audio technology when conducting fieldwork – as well as being conscious that the loudest sounds only represent half of the population.
After all, hearing what the females have to say will provide new insight into frog communities, which has the potential to benefit the nearly 8,000 species we know of.
The study was published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
Source: Universidade de São Paulo via Scimex
