200 new species found in rainforests

A MOUSE with a long white-tipped tail, a tiny frog, an orange spider and a white-flowered rhododendron are among the species discovered in remote mountain rainforests of Papua New Guinea, conservationists said.

More than 200 new species of animals and plants were found for the first time during two months surveying in the rugged and little-explored Nakanai and Muller mountain ranges last year, Conservation International said.

The findings included two new mammals, 24 species of frog, nine new plants, nearly 100 new insects including damselflies, crickets and ants, and around 100 spiders.

The mouse, at least one ant and several of the crickets, or katydids, are so different from other known species they each represent an entirely new genus, the scientists said.

They were uncovered by two scientific teams co-ordinated by Conservation International’s rapid assessment programme, in partnership with Papua New Guinea’s Institute for Biological Research and conservation organisation A Rocha International.

The teams explored different altitudes of the forest-cloaked Nakanai mountains, which host cave systems and some of the world’s largest underground rivers, and the Muller range, accessing the remote areas by plane, dingy, on foot and even by helicopter.

In the Nakanai surveys, scientists discovered a beautiful, yellow-spotted frog found only high up in the mountains, the mouse with the white-tipped tail and the tiny 2cm frog which calls for a mate in the afternoon – unlike most frogs in the area which call at night.

In the Muller range, researchers found what they described as a “spectacular variety” of insects, spiders and frogs.

One of the newly discovered katydids has exceptionally long spiny hind legs which it uses to jab at anything that threatens it.

Leeanne Alonso, Conservation International’s rapid assessment programme director said the discoveries were incredibly significant.

“While very encouraging, these discoveries do not mean that our global biodiversity is out of the woods,” she said.

“On the contrary, they should serve as a cautionary message about how much we don’t know about Earth’s still hidden secrets and important natural resources, which we can only preserve with co-ordinated, long term management.”

Dr Martin Kaonga, interim director of science and conservation at A Rocha International, who is based in Cambridge, said: “It’s very important we find these species, because it’s only when you know what species exist in an area that you may be in a position to understand how to manage that given area.”

He also said species may have uses, for example as medicines, and that there was a need to raise understanding among local people of the value of the wildlife found in their forests.

He added: “It is also telling us there could be species that are going extinct without us knowing, so it’s very important to have organised studies which help us to increase our knowledge of what exists.”

The scientists hope the discoveries will help secure World Heritage status for the two areas, in the face of pressure on Papua New Guinea’s forests from subsistence agriculture, logging and oil palm production.

Conservation International has been working with the provincial government and local communities in the Nakanai range to protect a large tract of rainforest from logging.