Two Painted Mantella Frogs:
Correctly Identifying Mantella baroni and Mantella madagascariensis
By Devin Edmonds

Among hobbyists there is a lot of confusion regarding Mantella baroni, Mantella madagascariensis and how to differentiate between the two. This is understandable - they look nearly identical. To make proper identification even more difficult, few reptile and amphibian suppliers distinguish between the two species, usually housing them together and labeling all with the common name painted mantella. Fortunately, by carefully examining individual frogs there are certain features that allow the two to be told apart.

Their ventral side offers the most reliable way to distinguish between the two. M. baroni has either a dot or solid black on the throat and small markings on the forelimbs, while M. madagascariensis has a horseshoe-shaped marking on the throat and may or may not have markings on the forelimbs. The hind limbs of M. baroni are solid red part way up to the thigh, while M. madagascariensis has red on the hind limbs through the thighs. Sometimes this red is slightly marbled with black or orange. Below is a sketch of the ventral side of M. baroni and M. madagascariensis, as well as a photo of the two for comparison.

Individual frogs sometimes exhibit ventral patterns that lie somewhere in between the two species. For this reason it is helpful to compare other features. The table below represents differences between M. baroni and M. madagascariensis. No one feature should be used as the only means of identification, as few individual frogs of either species exhibit all of the traits below. Instead, all information should be compared to that of an individual frog and whichever side matches the frog best is likely the species

Dorsal Side
Blank	Mantella baroni	Mantella madagascariensis
Snout to vent length	22 - 30 mm	20 - 27 mm
Dorsum color	Black	Black or black with yellow markings
Rostral stripe	Yellow/green - rarely touching flank blotch	Yellow/green - often touching flank blotch
Hind limbs	Orange with crossbands and markings	Orange, with or without black marbling or crossbands
Flashmarks	Not present	Distinct orange flashmarks
Iris	Solid black	Light pigment in upper half
Ventral Side
blank	Mantella baroni	Mantella madagascriensis
Venter	Black with few large, rounded, light markings	Black with large, rounded, light markings
Throat	Completely black or with single, round, marking	Black with horseshoe-shaped marking
Hind limbs	Partially orange without black markings	Orange, occasionally with yellow black markings

Information in above table summarized from
Vences, M., F. Glaw & W. Böhme. 1999. A review of the genus Mantella (Anura, Ranidae, Mantellinae): taxonomy, distribution and conservation of Malagasy poison frogs. Alytes 17 (1-2): 3-72.