Talk:Paedophryne amauensis

Is it the smallest?
What about this one? Photocorynus spiniceps

Does it count if just the male is smaller or do both sexes need to be smaller? The german Wikipedia lists Photocorynus spiniceps as smallest vertebrate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.88.117.31 (talk) 08:00, 13 January 2012 (UTC)


 * This is discussed in the article Smallest organisms. Modest Genius talk 10:35, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

The length "controversy" is discussed, on the PLoS ONE site, by one of the authors of the paper which introduced the species. To paraphrase him, publishing a length for a species is problematic. The authors discussed it and decided to use the average (of the specimens measured?). For P spiniceps, this would result in a huge difference since the females are quite large. I will leave it to wiser folks to decide if this averaging (vs. mean, vs. min/max) is the way to go. Rengewwj (talk) 23:47, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

I forgot to mention: When "measuring" trans-class or trans-order how does measuring compare, i.e., where are you measuring from and to? Is there a standardized position or posture for all frogs? Is the anglerfish's "lure" appendage included? This just ain't easy and maybe statements such as "worlds smallest" should not be used. Rengewwj (talk) 23:59, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
 * You should take up your complaint with the secondary sources which make this claim. Speciate (talk) 18:24, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Body weight, not length
I believe that Paedocypris, a fish, is quite a bit smaller than this frog. For one thing, most fish are much, much thinner than frogs, with Paedocypris being so thin that its body is mostly transparent. So, taking the length from head-to-rump as the only measurement of an animal's size is unfair. Additionally, the frogs are all measured with their legs folded up, making the comparison even more misleading. If we applied this measurement standard to humans, we would have to say that humans are only 3 feet tall.

I believe we should change "smallest" to "shortest" whenever possible, and when a secondary source specifically describes the frog as the smallest vertebrate, it still deserves mention that the measurement is biased towards the frogs. One thing that would help a lot is to obtain weight measurements in addition to height, but this seems to be difficult to find. — Soap — 13:42, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Guinness Book states that  the frog is 0.01 grams, while a site we have linked from List of smallest fish states that the fish is less than 1 milligram. If we  can trust these two authorities, then the fish wins by a factor of ten to one as the smallest vertebrate, and the frog can only be called the shortest vertebrate.  I would argue even that is unfair because the frog is measured with its legs folded up, but I wont belabor the point. — Soap — 13:40, 16 July 2022 (UTC)

Is "amauensis" a clerical error?
Amanuensis is a Latin word which is from ab + manus(“hand”) and the name "Paedophryne amanuensis" is used by lots of media such as The Telegraph.

So what is "amauensis"? User:小梨花 (talk) 20:06, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
 * "Amauensis" is correct. As it says in the article, the epithet refers to Amau Village, near which the species was discovered. 87.63.117.207 (talk) 20:24, 14 January 2012 (UTC)