''Thorius arboreus'', commonly known as the arboreal minute salamander, is a species of
salamander
Salamanders are a group of amphibians typically characterized by their lizard-like appearance, with slender bodies, blunt snouts, short limbs projecting at right angles to the body, and the presence of a tail in both larvae and adults. All t ...
in the family
Plethodontidae
Plethodontidae, or lungless salamanders, are a family of salamanders. With over 500 species, lungless salamanders are by far the largest family of salamanders in terms of their diversity. Most species are native to the Western Hemisphere, from B ...
. It is
endemic
Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...
to
Sierra Juárez,
Oaxaca
Oaxaca, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Oaxaca, is one of the 32 states that compose the political divisions of Mexico, Federative Entities of the Mexico, United Mexican States. It is divided into municipalities of Oaxaca, 570 munici ...
, Mexico.
The
specific name Specific name may refer to:
* in Database management systems, a system-assigned name that is unique within a particular database
In taxonomy, either of these two meanings, each with its own set of rules:
* Specific name (botany), the two-part (bino ...
''arboreus'', derives from the Latin word ''arbor'', meaning tree, referring to the arboreal habitat of this species.
Description
With males measuring and females in snout–vent length, it is a very small species even among the generally small ''Thorius''.
Habitat and conservation
Its natural habitat
In ecology, habitat refers to the array of resources, biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species' habitat can be seen as the physical manifestation of its ...
is cloud forest
A cloud forest, also called a water forest, primas forest, or tropical montane cloud forest, is a generally tropical or subtropical, evergreen, Montane forest, montane, Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests, moist forest characteri ...
. It is an arboreal
Arboreal locomotion is the locomotion of animals in trees. In habitats in which trees are present, animals have evolved to move in them. Some animals may scale trees only occasionally (scansorial), but others are exclusively arboreal. The hab ...
species typically occurring in the leaf axil
A leaf (: leaves) is a principal appendage of the plant stem, stem of a vascular plant, usually borne laterally above ground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leav ...
s of bromeliad
The Bromeliaceae (the bromeliads) are a Family (biology), family of monocot flowering plants of about 80 genera and 3700 known species, native mainly to the Tropics, tropical Americas, with several species found in the American subtropics and on ...
s. It tolerates some habitat degradation provided that shade remains. Main threats to it are encroachment of agriculture and logging.
See also
* Smallest organisms The smallest organisms found on Earth can be determined according to various aspects of organism size, including volume, mass, height, length, or genome size.
Given the incomplete nature of scientific knowledge, it is possible that the smallest or ...
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q1594460
arboreus
Fauna of the Sierra Madre de Oaxaca
Endemic amphibians of Mexico
Taxonomy articles created by Polbot
Amphibians described in 1994