Gururaja K.V. hid behind a tree and called “ treeek...ting...ting...ting. ” Several Coorg yellow bush frogs replied, “ treeek...ting...ting...ting .” When he called again, the amphibians leaped towards him. He snuck behind another tree and sang the frog song. The little leapers reoriented to his new position. For 90 minutes, the researcher played hide-and-seek as his subjects sought the intruder. One of them eventually found him and jumped on his throat. “It literally wanted to choke me,” he recalled, barely able to contain his laughter. Realising its opponent was much larger, the confused amphibian leapt off.
Gururaja’s experiments with mimicry led to another species trying to out-compete him. He imitated the bird-whistle call of the Jog night frog, signalling he was a male who had found a mate. His ‘rivals’ upped their volumes to drown out his chirps so that the female wouldn’t hear him.
To most people, all frogs look similar. Gururaja is one of the few experts who can point to slight differences that set species apart. He even discerns distinct personalities. His research subjects have names such as Hegde, Bhat, and Vishnu. The Hegde frog was talkative like Gururaja’s host in the area, Ashok Hegde. The frog he called Bhat was so quiet, the researcher had to check on it every hour.
Gururaja didn’t discover these amphibians until he was a master’s student at Karnataka’s Kuvempu University. Since he was an amateur birdwatcher, his advisor, S.V. Krishnamurthy, had suggested he list the species frequenting the campus. Gururaja wanted a more challenging project. How about studying the diet of night frogs, his advisor asked. That’s how his career in this field began.
At first, touching the frogs’ loose skin and slippery texture felt icky. After handling hundreds over a month, his disgust dissipated and he was hooked. Since no more than five people studied frogs at that time, making a mark in this under-researched area was easier than in the crowded field of bird research.
Much of the amphibian work in India is taxonomic — examining dead specimens, describing species, and establishing the relationship between different ones. After completing his postgraduate studies, Gururaja switched to studying their natural history. His curiosity and observations led to the discovery of one of the most enigmatic species — the kumbara night frog.
In 2006, Gururaja observed a female perform a headstand, with the male riding piggyback, to lay her eggs on leaves and twigs. The deed done, she hopped away, while the male picked up globules of mud with his tiny hands and plastered the mass of eggs until it was completely covered.
Gururaja spent the following eight years documenting more instances of this unusual behaviour before publishing his discovery. He continues to study the kumbara night frog, seeking answers to questions such as: why does it do what it does? Is it protecting its eggs? From what? Some species carry tadpoles on their backs such as poison dart frogs or in their mouths like gastric-brooding frogs. But no other amphibian stands on its hands or daubs mud on its eggs. He estimates he has enough work with night frogs alone to keep him occupied for another 15 to 20 years.
In northern Kerala, his team discovered another species, the ochlandra reed frog, with a beautiful yellow sunburst pattern in its eyes. He had seen nothing like it before. Nor had he seen any frog do what it subsequently did. It disappeared from view by squeezing into a hole in a length of reed bamboo. It wasn’t merely hiding from predators. To Gururaja’s astonishment, it stuck its eggs to the inner walls of the hollow columns. Researchers knew of no other amphibian that exploited this snug space as a nest site until 2011, when they saw a related species wriggling into a reed bamboo in Tamil Nadu’s Western Ghats.
Publishing natural history observations such as this demands tedious work. It’s not enough to report on one frog that did something exceptional. To be scientifically acceptable, researchers spend several seasons watching different frogs of the same species before they can conclude the behaviour is not an aberration.
Gururaja is mindful that spending long months during the rains in damp clothes and mucking in streams and swamps is not for everyone. He gives recording equipment to new students to record frog calls. In the process, the youngsters forge their own relationship with the forest and the creatures. Only a few turn their backs on this field deterred by leeches. Gururaja safeguards against burnout by taking a break after every five days of fieldwork.
The high humidity has greater success in killing recording equipment. No matter how well Gururaja treats his gear — wrapped in plastic, sheltered under an umbrella, wiping it dry at the end of each session — moisture condenses on the circuit boards, corroding them. He shrugs off the loss as par for the course in doing frog work.
One species resists Gururaja’s attempts to fool it with his mimicry. He can’t match the frequency of the kumbara night frog’s call, but it’s not from lack of trying. Every season, he tries afresh to challenge his favourite amphibians at their game, and one day he hopes to mislead one into thinking he’s of them.
