Listed as critically endangered, mainland New Zealand's only terrestrial frog has been at the centre of a massive conservation effort. First identified as a unique species in 1942, it's a nocturnal master of camouflage found only in small patches of forest in the King Country and Coromandel.
Auckland Zoo and Waikato Regional Council have both set aside funding to help study and protect the "enigmatic" frog in the past year, and they're not alone. An international gold-mining company has funded a big population study, published this week – but doubt is being cast on its findings.
The research is led by the longtime Department of Conservation ecologist Dr Brian Lloyd, now turned private consultant. Extraordinarily, it finds official estimates of 5000 to 20,000 Archey's frogs are massively understated. His modelling concludes there are more than 50 million in the wild.