SKIRMISHER

Discovered only about four years ago in India, the Nasikabatrachus sahyadrensis is a “chubby, seven-centimeter-long, purple amphibian with a pointy snout.” It was found hopping around in the Western Ghats, a range of hills in western India [Wikipedia entry here].

Scientists have given it the name Nasikabatrachus sahyadrensis, from the Sanskrit word for nose (nasika); batrachus, meaning frog; and Sahyadri, the name for its mountain home.

Its head appears too small for its body and it looks more like a squat, grumpy blob than a living creature.

But to the scientists who describe it in the journal Nature, the frog is a beautiful find because of what it tells them about Earth history.

“It is an important discovery because it tells us something about the early evolution of advanced frogs that we would not know otherwise because there are no fossil records from this lineage,” says Franky Bossuyt, of Free University of Brussels, Belgium.

While this purple frog reminds us of a shiny lump of ice cream, our resident starving bums agree it would be a succulent main course for what will be called “Roasted Purple Frog Delight.” The legs look particularly tasty.

More mouth-watering images after the jump.

(Thanks Indra!)

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