Swimming in a pool of cannibals after being abandoned by one’s parents is a pretty grim situation. But a tadpole that finds itself here doesn’t passively await its fate. Instead, it tries to jump onto the back of any visiting frog and hitch a ride to safety. Even if the frog has no interest in a rescue, the tadpole is ready to rescue itself.

Not all Ranitomeya variabilis parents abandon their young. These Peruvian poison dart frogs lay two to six eggs at a time in water, and the fathers u