Giant Leaf Frog

The Giant Leaf Frog is a hylid frog found throughout the Amazon Rainforest of northern Bolivia, western and northern Brazil, south-eastern Colombia, eastern Peru, southern and eastern Venezuela, and the Guianas. This species is now jeopardized by biopiracy because it produces a waxy secretion that may have medicinal uses against AIDS, cancer and other diseases. The poison has been reported to produce a variety of effects ranging from stimulation, to sedation, anorexia, and hallucinations. The poison contains dermorphin and deltorphin which act on opioid receptors.

Dyeing Dart Frog

Dyeing Dart Frog is the third largest of the poison dart frogs, at approximately two inches. This big old frog employs poison in self-defense and comes in many different colors and patterns. What is really unique about the dyeing dart frog is the way indigenous tribes of the Guiana Shield make use of it. The tribespeople massage the skin of juvenile parrots with the frog, and the toxic effect of its poison makes the birds’ feathers grow in different colors – hence the frog’s name. The poison is also used by the tribes for hunting purposes.

Red-backed Poison Frog

Red-backed Poison Frog, to advertise its poison and further reduce the risk of injury, the red-backed poison frog displays its brilliant warning colors, especially its red-orange back, for which it is named. Like all dendrobatids, it does not manufacture its poison itself, but rather takes the toxins from the Amazonian fire ants on which it lives. It absorbs the ants’ neurotoxic venom into its body, which is immune to the poison. The poison is stored in skin glands just beneath the frog’s epidermis. The poison seeps through open wounds and orifices, and, it is believed, through the pores. This defense is especially effective against mammalian and avian predators, and, to a lesser extent, reptilian ones. Amazonian ground snakes have a limited resistance to the poison, and occasionally will attack such frogs.

Strawberry Poison Dart Frog

With its bright red skin, the tiny Strawberry Poison Dart Frog, native to Central America, is one of the most beautiful of the species listed here. Its poison is pretty toxic stuff, causing swelling and a burning sensation, but is still far weaker than that of the Phyllobates genus of poison dart frogs, for example.

Blue Poison Dart Frog

The Blue Poison Dart Frog‘s poison can paralyze or kill any predator not warned away by its coloring, and could even potentially prove deadly to a human: 2 micrograms of the toxic compound is enough to be fatal, and the creature can have much, much more than this in its system! However, like all the poison dart frogs, this native of South America is not poisonous in captivity when deprived of its natural diet.

Lovely Poison Frog

Lovely Poison Frog‘s amount of toxin is thought to be comparatively low, ranging from nothing to 0.8 micrograms, but this frog is still far from harmless and can cause heart failure in predators that risk eating it.

Golfodulcean Poison Frog

Golfodulcean Poison Frog has highly potent neurotoxic alkaloid poisons in their skin. While it is only the fourth-most toxic of the genus, the Golfodulcean poison frog is still a highly toxic animal. Its poison causes severe pain, mild seizures, and paralysis in severe cases. The frog, for protection, advertises its toxin with its multi-coloured body. Because it is of comparatively large size for a poison dart frog, the Golfodulcean poison frog can store a large amount of poison in its skin.

Splash-backed Poison Frog

Splash-backed Poison Frog is the most toxic member of its genus, with the secretions from its skin said to be capable of killing up to five humans. Its mottled coloring may look pretty, but the message is simple: stay away.

Phantasmal Poison Frog

Phantasmal poison frogs have one of the strongest toxins of frogs. Their toxicity is known to be lethal. A chemical extracted from the skin of this species has turned out to be of medicinal use. A painkiller 200-times as potent as morphine, called epibatidine. Secretions from dendrobatids are also showing promise as muscle relaxants and heart stimulants.

Kokoe Poison Dart Frog

Kokoe Poison Dart Frog is very dangerous and it’s poison is like acid in its effects, seeping through wounds, and possibly pores, and causing symptoms ranging from unbearable pain and fever to seizures and paralysis. So far there have been no confirmed human deaths, but fatalities are suspected. To obtain the poison of the kokoe poison dart frog and its related species, tribesmen of the Colombian forests impale the frog on a stick and hold it over the fire so that the toxins come to the surface, ready to be rubbed onto their arrow tips.

Black-legged Dart Frog

Black-legged Dart Frog is still a highly toxic animal, one of the few frogs confirmed to have caused human fatalities. Just 150 micrograms of its poison is enough to kill an adult human. This frog is often heated over a flame to make it “sweat” the liquid poison for hunting darts. The poison causes death by respiratory and muscular paralysis. Research is being conducted to determine medicinal uses for this batrachotoxin. As with all dart frogs, captive-raised individuals are not toxic; the animals require chemicals found only in their wild food sources, mainly insects. In captivity, these chemicals are not available to them from their food source.

Golden Poison Frog

Golden Poison Frog is one of the most poisonous animals on the planet. Small enough to fit comfortably in your palm it nevertheless has enough poison in its skin secretions to kill 10 to 20 men, or two African bull elephants. This frog is rumored to have ended the lives of people who have touched it, while chickens and dogs have died from contact with a paper towel it has merely walked on.