An assessment of endemism and species richness patterns in the Australian Anura

Abstract

Aim To assemble a continental‐scale data set of all available anuran records and investigate trends in endemism and species richness for the Anura. Location Continental Australia. Methods 97,338 records were assembled, covering 75% of the continent. A neighbourhood analysis was applied to recorded locations for each species to measure richness and endemism for each half‐degree grid square (c. 50 km) in the continent. This analysis was performed for all anurans, and also for each of the three main anuran families found in Australia. A Monte Carlo simulation was used to test a null hypothesis that observed centres of endemism could result simply from an unstructured overlapping of species ranges of different sizes. Results Eleven main centres of anuran endemism were identified, the most important being the Wet Tropics and the south‐west near Bunbury‐Augusta and near Walpole. With the exception of south‐western Australia, all of the identified significant endemic centres are in the northern half of the continent. The regions identified as significant for endemism differed from those identified for species richness and are more localized. Species richness is greatest in the Wet Tropics and the Border Ranges. High species richness also occurs in several areas not previously identified along the east and northern coasts. Main conclusions Weighted endemism provides a new approach for determining significant areas for anuran conservation in Australia and areas can be identified that could be targeted for beneficial conservation gains. Patterns in endemism were found to vary markedly between the three main anuran families, and south‐eastern Australia was found to be far less significant than indicated by previous studies. The need for further survey work in inland Australia is highlighted and several priority areas suggested. Our results for species richness remain broadly consistent with trends previously observed for the Australian Anura.

Herpetological assemblages of the Pilbara biogeographic region, Western Australia: ecological associations, biogeographic patterns and conservation

“…The Pilbara region is host to only 13 species of frogs, slightly more diverse than the surrounding arid regions which are not diverse relative to the northern tropics, eastern coast and south-west (Slatyer et al 2007;Tyler and Doughty 2009;Powney et al 2009). Below we briefl y review some broad patterns identifi able from distribution maps.…”

Biogeographic patterns of frogs of the Kimberley islands, Western Australia

“…The Kimberley region of Western Australia (WA) is home to approximately 40 species of frogs, and is a region of pronounced endemism within the Australian frog fauna Slatyer et al 2007;Tyler and Doughty 2009;Bowman et al 2010;Powney et al 2010;Doughty 2011). Some species are common and widely distributed in northern Australia, such as Cyclorana australis, Litoria caerulea and Platyplectrum ornatum, with ranges often extending from the Kimberley region beyond Cambridge Gulf, through the Top End (northern Northern Territory [NT]) and in to Queensland.…”

Endemic Amphibians and Their Distribution in China

“…Therefore, we should delimit the distributions of endemic taxa ideally using natural and geographic boundaries rather than administrative boundaries. Moreover, two types of errors (i. e., the overweighting of the widespread species regarded in the literature but with few observational records; the erroneous records for species with narrow recorded ranges which create comparatively high endemism scores in wrong places), should be emphasized when the distributions of endemics are being interpreted (Slatyer et al, 2007). Despite these issues, exploring the patterns of endemism and the distributions of endemics is important for understanding regional characters, compositions and evolutionary process of fauna, and also is of particular interest in the development of integrative conservation strategies (Jablonski, 1986;Grau et al, 2007).…”

“…Previous biogeographic studies on amphibians in China mainly focused on threatened species, diversity across all species, or elevational patterns of regional frogs (Fu et al, 2006;Xie et al, 2007;Jiang et al, 2010). It is suggested that the level of available survey efforts, the consequent number of records available for assessment, and the identification of new species can strongly influence biogeographic assessments (Slatyer et al, 2007). Molecular analyses are increasingly used in systematics and some species complexes or cryptic species are recognized (e. g., Nishikawa et al, 2011b;Yang et al, 2011).…”