Most Bizarre New Animals
Newly discovered in the Foja Mountains of New Guinea, this tree frog has an impressive appendage. When the male frog calls, the "Pinocchio-like protuberance on its nose ... points upwards," reports Conservation International. When the frog's done calling, its nose goes limp.
After the British Antarctic Survey ventured into the depths of the Southern Ocean, they revealed an array of bizarre new sea creatures to the world. Among them: this sandhopper, an amphipod that grows to unusually large proportions. Typically a tiny inhabitant of the sea, sandhoppers here have grown enormously to fill in the place of crabs in the ecosystem.
While sea pigs may be common in the icy waters of the Southern Ocean, they are utterly unfamiliar to us. British Antarctic Survey scientists who observed them say they are among the most common sea creatures lurking in the depths off Antarctica -- something like an underwater hog farm.
With a call so high-pitched it's inaudible to the human ear, it's a wonder scientists were able to find this katydid at all, when Conservation International led a 2009 expedition to Equador, near the border of Peru.
The leaf deer, the world's smallest deer species, stands just over 2.5 feet, weighs about 25 pounds and lives in Myanmar . The deer is so small, scientists affiliated with WWF first thought it was the baby of another species.
This wallaby, the world's smallest member of the kangaroo family, was identified in 2010 in the Foja Mountains of New Guinea, by Conservation International.
You know you've got it bad when the first wave of press about you focuses less on the shock that you are a new species to science and more on your appearance, but that's what happened to this guy, the ugly salamander. The folks in PR later suggested he had a look reminiscent of the beloved ET - The Extra Terrestrial.
This big venomous scorpion, about three-inches long, was the first scorpion ever documented in Nepal.
This frog, among 1,000 new species discovered in the Mekong region of Thailand by WWF in recent years, is so mean it is known to catch and eat bids with fangs that protrude from its bottom jawbone. Yes, folks, it's a vampire-frog.
This frog was generously described as "pea-sized" when Conservation International announced, in August 2010, the Microhyla nepenthicola frog's discovery in a pitcher plant on Borneo, an island in Southeast Asia. At first, scientists assumed they were looking at young frogs, but soon concluded that even the largest of the adult males fail to reach more than half an inch in length. Now, they describe it as the tiniest frog known to inhabit the Old World (Europe, Asia and Africa).
This tiny new species of titi monkey is cute. What's bizarre about it? Researchers say that as soon as it was discovered, by Conservation International in the Amazon, it could be considered endangered. Deforestation in the Colombian Amazon is rampant, and this fuzzy monkey lives in the forest.
A long-running and often violent border dispute between Equador and Peru kept scientists away for decades, but when they did explore the region in 2009, they found many species new to science, and some that were just bizarre, like this crystal frog with skin so translucent, you can see its heart beating through its tiny chest.
Perhaps you've heard of flying squirrels, or even flying foxes. This is a flying frog, one of 350 new Himalayan species discovered by WFF and its partners in the last decade. It spreads its toes and glides from the heights of treetops on its generously webbed feet.
Last seen in 1985, scientists are searching for evidence of this gastric brooding frog in the wilds of Australia. In 1914, this was one of two such frogs found to raise its young in a truly bizarre manner: Females swallow the eggs, and alter the chemistry of their stomachs so that tadpoles can develop in the absence of acidic digestive juices. Then -- you guessed it! -- they give birth through their mouths. Not for nothing, the frog's digestive switcheroo could give doctors a new treatment for stomach ulcers --- if, that is, the frog hasn't gone extinct.
Aptly named, this ice fish can literally become as cold as ice, according to the British Antarctic Survey scientists who described it on a recent expedition in the Southern Ocean. No red blood cells course through the veins of this fish: Instead, it has antifreeze.
The discovery of this legless lizard was a highlight of a fruitful expedition of discovery in Brazil's hot, sandy Cerrado region in April 2008. Why is it a "legless lizard" and not a snake? That's up to the scientists.
One of the smallest species of vertebrates ever identified in the Andes, and one of the smallest frogs in the New World, this creature is aptly named the minute frog -- Pristimantis minimus to the Conservation International scientists who named it.
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