This species is associated with rocky habitats-sandstone hills and gorges, rocky screen and ledges, boulder fields, caves and open escarpments, usually near perennial and non-perennial streams in dry grassland/shrubland. It shelters deep in caves. It breeds in spring and summer. Males call from beneath boulders in or near the streambed. About 350–400 eggs are laid in a foam nest in rock pools or beneath rocks at the edge of water-draining scree slopes. Tadpoles develop in ponds in about nine weeks.

This endemic species of northern Australia is known from the eastern Kimberley region of Western Australia, eastwards into the western escarpment of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory. There is a reasonably deep division between samples from subpopulations in Kununurra/Mitchell Falls and Birndu, Northern Territory reported by Schauble et al. (2000), reflecting the isolation of major rock formations. The estimated altitudinal range of the species is from 150–600 m asl.

Conservation Actions In-Place
Its range includes multiple protected areas in Western Australia and the Northern Territory.