Meet the Water-holding frog
The water-holding frog is a desert survivor. When pools dry up it digs into the mud with spade-like hind feet, then sheds layers of skin to make a waterproof cocoon that stops it from drying out.
Before it buries itself it takes up a lot of water and stores it in its bladder and skin, up to about half its body weight. It can stay underground in this state for months and possibly up to about five years, waiting for heavy rain.
When a big downpour finally comes, the frogs emerge and breed at once in temporary pools. Females can lay several hundred eggs, and the tadpoles race to turn into frogs in as little as two weeks, often around 40 days, before the water vanishes.
Where it lives
Lives in inland eastern Australia: western New South Wales, southern Queensland, north-eastern South Australia and parts of the Northern Territory. Western Australian populations are now treated as a separate species, the western water-holding frog. It lives in arid and semi-arid plains, claypans and temporary pools.