It looks like 2008 will have as many new species finds as other recent years.

The Darwin Institute has announced that eleven new species of animals and plants have been discovered in Costa Rica.

Two frogs and six plant species, including a mistletoe with a “spectacular flower,” were among the finds never before seen by scientists.

The three salamanders, one of them a dwarf species little more than an inch long, were discovered after zoologists spent nights stripping tree trunks of moss and other vegetation in the cloud forest in La Amistad National Park in Costa Rica.

Finds

Salamanders: Two new Bolitoglossa and a Mototriton (dwarf salamander)

Frogs: Two new Eleuthero-dactyl I

Plants: Pilea, Stenospermation, Oreopanax, Psitticanthus, Cuatresia and Cestrum