DLTK's Crafts for Kids
Puerto Rico Section - Coquí

The Puerto Rican coquí is a very small - tiny - tree frog about one inch long.  Some coquíes look green, some brown and some yellowish - actually they are translucent. Coquíes have a high pitched sound and can be heard from far away.

The coquíes begin to sing when the sun goes down at dusk.  Their melody serenades islanders to sleep. Coquíes sing all night long until dawn when they stop singing and head for the nest.  Puerto Ricans love their coquíes and have written poems, stories, and Aguinaldos about them.

During the time of the Taíno Indians trillions of coquíes serenated our ancestral home. Many Taíno Indian myths surround the coqui.  When you look at Puerto Rican Taíno art you can see that the coquí meant a lot to them. Coquíes are found in much of the Taíno art like pictographs and pottery.

In Puerto Rico all coquíes are called coquí even though not all sing ''co-quí''. Only two of the species the ''Coquí Común'' and the ''Coquí de la Montaña or Coquí Puertorriqueño'' actually sing ''co-quí''.

Puerto Rican coquíes have relatives all over Latin America.  The coquí genre is found in all the Caribbean Islands, and in Central and South America.  But again, the only ones that make the sound ''co-quí'' are Puerto Rican.

The scientific name for the coquí is Eleu-thero-dactylus, characterized because they have no webbed toes.  There are 16 different species in Puerto Rico and all of them have padded discs at the end of their toes which helps them climb. Coquíes are classified as amphibians - a grouping for cold blooded vertebrates that includes frogs, toads, or newts -that are able to live in both water and land.

Contrary to frogs, the coquíes do not go through a tadpole stage and break out of their egg - a small replica of their parents. Some coquíes are terrestrial some are arboreal.  The Coquí Dorado is the only species in the world that bears live young.

The male coquí sings - not the female.  That means that in Puerto Rico we hear only half the coquies that are there sing.  The male coquí watches over the eggs.  The eggs hatch in 28 days and the young coquíes remain in the nest for an additional 5 days.  Again the male coquí watches over them until they leave the nest.

When there is more light either from the moon or from street lights, there are less coquies.  Therefore there are more coquies in isolated areas like the mountains.  The ''Puerto Rican coqui'' sings co-qui, co-qui, co-qui at dusk and changes to co-qui-qui-qui, co-qui-qui-qui, co-qui-qui-qui, at dawn.  It is arboreal - climbing to the top of trees in search of insects. There it remains until dawn when it changes its song and jumps down nesting until the evening.

Coquies are in danger of extinction and actually two of them are already extinct - the Coqui Dorado and the Coqui Palmeado. Others are endangered species like the Coqui Caoba and the Coqui de Eneida. Why are coquies in extinction? Because of deforestation.  People have destroyed their habitat often destroying their eggs and destroying their source of food and nourishment.
 

Here are some Frog activities you might be interested in doing.  They were made generically, but you can color them in to look as much like a coqui as possible.

	Frog Bean Bag Age 9+ Must be able to use a hot glue gun or sew to make the project...  Young children love to help stuff it or receive it as a gift!
	Frog Coloring Pages
	Frog Craft - Toilet Paper Roll preschool and kindergarten
	Frog Life Cycle Craft preschool and kindergarten
	Frog Paper Craft preschoolers and up
	Frog Paper Bag Puppet preschoolers and up
	Paper Mache Frog Craft suitable for Ages 7+ Easy Version of the Frog Craft suitable for Ages 3+ Use this craft for the 5 green speckled frogs game Instructions for the Game or just for storing treasures
	Frog Pouch preschool and kindergarten
	Frog Puppet preschool and kindergarten
	Frog Shapes Practice Craft preschoolers and up