Species
Bird-voiced treefrog
Dryophytes avivoca
A treefrog of flooded swamps whose whistled call sounds more like a bird than a frog.
Photo Alex Stach (opens in a new tab) / iNaturalist, CC BY 4.0 (opens in a new tab)
At a glance
- Size
- About 2.5 to 5 cm long
- Habitat
- Wooded swamps and floodplains along rivers
- Diet
- Insects
- In Georgia
- River swamps of the western and southern Coastal Plain
- Voice
- A rapid series of bird-like whistles
- Rabies vector
- No
Identification
- Key marks
- Grey or green with lichen-like blotches; a pale spot below the eye; greenish-yellow under the thighs
- Told apart from
- Cope's gray treefrog, which is larger, trills, and is bright orange-yellow under the thighs
- Where to look
- Calling from shrubs and trees in flooded swamps
Behaviour
It calls from trees over standing water in swamps and breeds in their shallow pools in spring and summer.
Why they matter
It depends on bottomland swamps, some of the richest wildlife habitats in the Southeast.
Reproduction and lifecycle
Eggs — Small clusters in shallow swamp water
Hatching — In a few days
Tadpoles — Change into frogs in several weeks
Maturity — Within a year
Lifespan — A few years
Calling — On warm nights
Living around people
- It is rarely near houses; leaving swamps intact is what it needs.
Misconceptions
- Whistling in a swamp at night is a bird. It is often this frog.
Related species
Seasonal activity
When this species is breeding, and when there are nests on the ground. Mowing during the shaded months is how most nests are found.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Breeding | Jan: no | Feb: no | Mar: no | Apr: no | May: no | Jun: no | Jul: no | Aug: no | Sep: no | Oct: no | Nov: no | Dec: no |
| Active nests | Jan: no | Feb: no | Mar: no | Apr: no | May: no | Jun: no | Jul: no | Aug: no | Sep: no | Oct: no | Nov: no | Dec: no |
| Notes | Sheltering | Sheltering | Sheltering | Calling | Breeding | Breeding | Breeding | Young frogs | Feeding | Sheltering on cool nights | Sheltering | Sheltering |
Where it lives
Recorded in 9 states and provinces. Each one links to the other animals there, and to the rehabilitators licensed for them.
If you found one
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