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Abstract
Mortality rates are often high during the anuran tadpole stage, making demographic parameters in this phase of their life cycle important to the understanding of population demography. Nevertheless, information on mortality rates or population size is lacking for most Brazilian anurans. Herein we report on the demographic parameters of Phasmahyla jandaia (Hylidae) during the larval stage, including number of individuals through time, mortality rates and time of recruitment. Tadpole recruitment occurred year‐round, although froglet recruitment to the terrestrial habitat was restricted to the warm, rainy season. This trend seems to result in high plasticity of the tadpole developmental period. Mortality rates decreased with advancing tadpole stage, totalling 77% during the whole aquatic phase. Survivorship can be regarded as intermediate compared with other anurans for which data are available, and is in accordance with a high investment in egg size and the low number of eggs laid by P. jandaia.
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to C.G. Leal, C.F.D. Rocha, and L.B. Nascimento for helpful suggestions in the manuscript, E.R. Wild for reviewing the English of the manuscript, the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) for research support, L.Q. Amorin and the Minerações Brasileiras Reunidas S/A (MBR) for financial support, and Companhia de Saneamento de Minas Gerais (COPASA) for the permit to work at the Estação Ecológica de Fechos.