Head to head
Wallace's Flying Frog vs Flying Dragon
A flying frog and a flying dragon are not related in any way, one an amphibian and the other a reptile, but both solve the same problem, getting around a tall rainforest canopy quickly and safely, by gliding rather than flying, and comparing how each does it is a neat lesson in convergent evolution.
| Wallace's Flying Frog | Flying Dragon | |
|---|---|---|
| Animal group | Amphibian | Reptile |
| Gliding structure | Webbed hands and feet, flank skin | Rib-supported skin flap (patagium) |
| Typical glide distance | Up to about 15 metres | Up to about 8 to 10 metres |
| Habitat | Rainforest canopy of Borneo, Sumatra, Malay Peninsula | Forest of South and Southeast Asia |
| Diet | Insects | Ants and other small insects |
| When it glides | Escaping predators, moving through canopy | Escaping predators, moving between trees |
| Folding the gliding surface | Limbs fold back to the body | Ribs fold the flap flat against the body |
| Breeding | Foam nest over water | Eggs buried in soil at the base of a tree |
Wallace's Flying Frog vs Flying Dragon: common questions
Are Wallace's flying frog and the flying dragon related?
No, they are not related at all, belonging to entirely separate classes of animal, with the flying frog an amphibian and the flying dragon a reptile, and their shared ability to glide through the forest canopy is a clear example of convergent evolution, where two unrelated lineages independently arrive at a broadly similar solution, gliding, to the same problem of moving efficiently and safely through a tall forest. Their gliding structures are built from completely different tissues and body parts, webbed limbs and flank skin in the frog against an extended rib-supported membrane in the lizard, underlining that the resemblance is functional rather than a sign of shared ancestry.
Which glides farther, the flying frog or the flying dragon?
Wallace's flying frog generally covers more ground in a single glide, with documented distances of around 15 metres from a high launch point, thanks to the large surface area created by its extensively webbed hands and feet together with loose flank skin. A flying dragon typically glides a somewhat shorter distance, commonly cited at up to around 8 to 10 metres, using its rib-supported skin flap, though it can also make repeated short glides between closely spaced trees rather than needing one very long glide, so in practice both animals move through the canopy efficiently even though the frog achieves greater distance per glide.
Why did two such different animals both evolve gliding?
Both a tree frog and a tree-dwelling lizard living high in a tall rainforest canopy face the same basic challenges, needing to move between trees to find food, mates, or safety, and needing to escape predators quickly, while climbing all the way down to the ground and back up another tree would be slow, energetically costly, and dangerous. Gliding offers a fast, relatively low-cost way to cover a useful horizontal distance from a high starting point, and because both animals already had loose skin or flexible ribs that could be adapted into a larger surface area with only gradual modification, natural selection favoured the individuals with slightly more effective gliding structures in each lineage, independently producing two very different anatomical solutions to the same ecological pressure.