Geographical Variation in Morphological and Bioacoustic Traits ofPseudopaludicola mystacalis(Cope, 1887) and a Reassessment of the Taxonomic Status ofPseudopaludicola serranaToledo, 2010 (Anura: Leptodactylidae: Leiuperinae)

Abstract

Comparisons of advertisement calls of anurans can be used to determine intra- and interspecific differences or affinities. Described from midwestern Brazil,Pseudopaludicola mystacalisis widely distributed and abundant in major open Brazilian ecosystems. However, researchers frequently fail to determine the true taxonomic status of some of these populations and attribute them to unidentified or misidentified species. Herein, we employ morphological and bioacoustic data to reassess the distribution range and to evaluate intraspecific variation inP. mystacalisbased on specimens from fifteen localities and seven Brazilian states. We also reassess the distribution and taxonomic status ofPseudopaludicola serrana, herein considered as a junior synonym ofP. murundubased on morphology, bioacoustics, and molecular data.

Intraspecific Variation in Acoustic Traits and Body Size, and New Distributional Records for Pseudopaludicola Giarettai Carvalho, 2012 (Anura, Leptodactylidae, Leiuperinae): Implications for Its Congeneric Diagnosis

“…Morphological/morphometric features might have little contribution to assess specific identity of Pseudopaludicola, whereas acoustic information has revealed cryptic diversity and has contributed to the reassessment of taxonomic status within this Neotropical frog group. In the last four years, six species were described (in chronological order: P. giarettai, P. hyleaustralis, P. facureae, P. parnaiba, P. pocoto, and P. atragula;Carvalho, 2012;Pansonato et al, 2012Pansonato et al, , 2014aAndrade & Carvalho, 2013;Roberto et al, 2013;Magalhães et al, 2014), one revalidated (P. ameghini; Pansonato et al, 2013), and two invalidated (P. riopiedadensis and P. serrana; Cardozo & Toledo, 2013;Pansonato et al, 2014b) taking into account this line of evidence. Therefore, it is essential to obtain, whenever it is possible, the association of advertisement call pattern to Pseudopaludicola specimens to unambiguous assessment of their species identity.…”

Diet and morphological aspects of a population of Pseudopaludicola pocoto (Anura: Leptodactylidae) from Northeast Brazil

“…Diferenças no tamanho corpóreo de anfíbios pode ser atribuído à idade, taxa de crescimento ou longevidade (Otero et al, 2017). No entanto, espécies do gênero Pseudopaludicola apresentam elevada variação intraespecífica e valores morfométricos interespecíficos muito semelhantes (De-Carvalho et al, 2015b), o que possibilita a existência de diferentes populações dessas espécies em que pode ou não haver diferenças sexuais quanto ao tamanho do corpo.…”

“…O gênero Pseudopaludicola Miranda Ribeiro, 1926 compreende atualmente 22 espécies de rãs da América do Sul, de ocorrência em países como Argentina, Bolívia, Colômbia, Brasil, Guiana, Paraguai, Uruguai, Venezuela e leste dos Andes (Cardozo et al, 2018). No Brasil, o gênero está representado por 18 espécies (Cardozo et al, 2018), cinco das quais são conhecidas para o domínio da Caatinga (sensu Ab'Saber, 1977): Pseudopaludicola mystacalis Cope 1887, Pseudopaludicola ternetzi Miranda-Ribeiro 1937, Pseudopaludicola parnaiba Roberto et al 2013, Pseudopaludicola pocoto Magalhães et al 2014 e Pseudopaludicola jaredi Andrade et al 2016. Estudos envolvendo espécies do gênero Pseudopaludicola ainda são escassos e predominantemente de caráter taxonômico (Lobo, 1995(Lobo, , 1996Pansonato et al, 2014;De-Carvalho et al, 2015a). Poucos foram os trabalhos que abordaram aspectos alimentares, amplitude de nicho trófico, tamanho corpóreo e parasitismo para essas espécies (Van Sluys e Rocha, 1998;Duré, 2002;Duré et al, 2004;Silva et al, 2018).…”

The advertisement call of the phytotelm-breeding Melanophryniscus xanthostomus (Anura: Bufonidae)

“…Vocalizations are imperative to solve major taxonomic problems in many distinct anuran groups (Haddad and Pombal-Jr 1998, Carvalho and Giaretta 2013, Pansonato et al 2014. The most common vocalization among anuran repertoire is the advertisement call (Wells 2007), which is species-specific and therefore useful for species identification (Gerhardt and Davis 1988).…”