frog as broad as a dinner plate

Size
Length: 10–15 cm
Lifespan
10–20 years
Diet
Carnivorous – fed on invertebrates in the damp cathedral floors of prehistoric New Zealand. A giant Leiopelma frog, stockier and broader-skulled than any living native frog. Lived alongside moa, adzebills, and giant wētā, hunting invertebrates in a world without ground mammals.
Habitat
Deep podocarp-broadleaf forests, fern-draped gullies, and mossy understorey of the North and South Islands. Lived alongside moa, adzebills, and giant wētā, hunting invertebrates in a world without ground mammals. Its kingdom was the wet, the dark, and the rotten-log rich.
Range
Found in deep podocarp-broadleaf forests, fern-draped gullies, and mossy understorey of the North and South Islands. Fossil evidence tells us larger relatives existed – stockier, broader-skulled frogs that pushed the limits of what a Leiopelma could be. These giants are gone. No exact extinction date.
Endemism
Endemic
Main Threats
Habitat loss from forest clearance and predation by introduced rats were the primary threats. New Zealand once had at least four Leiopelma species. Today, only four survive – three on the mainland and one on Stephens Island. But fossil evidence tells us larger relatives existed. These giants are gone. Just bones in cave deposits.
Population
New Zealand once had at least four Leiopelma species. Today, only four survive – three on the mainland and one on Stephens Island. But fossil evidence tells us larger relatives existed – stockier, broader-skulled frogs that pushed the limits of what a Leiopelma could be. These giants are gone. No exact extinction date.
Conservation Status
Extinct
A frog the size of a small apple. Not a bullfrog – those are imports, loud and brash and North American. A quiet, almost primitive frog, with a round body, short legs, and skin so smooth it looks polished. It doesn't croak. It doesn't have eardrums. It doesn't even have a tongue that flips out. It is, by modern standards, a weird little throwback. Now imagine it bigger. That was the giant frog of New Zealand. Lineage made it special. Leiopelmatids are the oldest living frog family on Earth – living fossils that have barely changed in 200 million years. They walked with dinosaurs. They watched continents split. And in New Zealand, isolated from the rest of the world, they evolved into forms found nowhere else. The giant frogs were simply the biggest, boldest versions of this ancient experiment. They did the same thing their smaller cousins do today – but more of it. They hunted at night, sitting motionless on the forest floor, waiting for invertebrates to wander past. Then they lunged. Not with a tongue (remember – no flip tongue) but with their whole body, mouth gaping, swallowing prey whole. They laid eggs on damp ground – not in water – and the tadpoles developed inside the egg, hatching as fully formed froglets. No pond. No swimming. Just forest, moisture, and patience. The usual suspects arrived in waves. First, the kiore (Pacific rat) with Polynesian settlers. Rats eat frogs. They eat frog eggs. They eat everything slow, soft, and ground-dwelling. Second, the ship rat and Norway rat with Europeans – faster, bigger, hungrier. Third, stoats, ferrets, cats, hedgehogs. A frog that evolved for 200 million years without mammalian predators had no defence. It didn't know to run. It didn't know to hide. It just sat there, being ancient and delicious, while the world changed around it. The giant frogs are gone. Their smaller cousins cling on in scattered pockets – the Coromandel, the Whareorino Forest, a few offshore islands. Every time a stoat reaches a new valley, another population winks out. They are the ancient hoppers because they hopped through the age of reptiles, the age of birds, and nearly the age of humans. But nearly is not entirely. And nearly doesn't bring back the giants.