Cophixalus

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Cophixalus
Cophixalus caverniphilus

Cophixalus caverniphilus

Systematics
without rank: Amphibians (Lissamphibia)
Order : Frog (anura)
Subordination : Neobatrachia
Family : Narrow-mouth frogs (Microhylidae)
Subfamily : Papuan narrow-mouth frogs (Asterophryinae)
Genre : Cophixalus
Scientific name
Cophixalus
Boettger , 1892
Occurrence of Cophixalus species in northeastern Australia , but the main range is in New Guinea .
Cophixalus ornatus with an inflated throat pouch
Male and young of Cophixalus saxatilis
Female of Cophixalus saxatilis
Cophixalus infacetus

Cophixalus is a genus of the frog from the subfamily of the Papuan narrow-mouth frogs (Asterophryinae) within the family of the narrow-mouthed frogs . Their distribution area extends from northeast Australia over Papua New Guinea to the Indonesian part of New Guinea . With 65 species it is the largest genus of the Papuan narrow-mouth frogs.

features

Many species of the genus Cophixalus are among the smallest vertebrates in the world. Some specimens only reach a head-torso length of 1.4 to 1.5 centimeters in males, even in the adult stage of life . B. several species from New Guinea such as Cophixalus tridactylus and from Australia such as Cophixalus crepitans . The females become slightly larger. The largest frog of this genus is Cophixalus riparius with a head-trunk length of a maximum of 5 centimeters.

Many skeletal elements are stunted or missing. In his first description of the genus in 1892 , Oskar Boettger stated the absence of an omosternum and procoracoid, including the collarbones, as the main features. Numerous species that matched this description were placed in the genus Cophixalus in the 20th century. In some species, the thumbs are completely reduced so that only three fingers are visible on the forelimbs.

Since the variability of most characteristics and the way of life within the genus is very large, it is assumed that the group is not monophyletic .

Occurrence

The distribution area extends from the Wet Tropics of Queensland in northeast Australia (19 species) to the rainforests of New Guinea (45 species, mainly in the eastern part of the main island) and the Moluccan island of Halmahera ( Cophixalus montanus ). The frogs live mainly on the ground or at low altitude on bushes and trees near rivers and streams. Their larval development takes place entirely in the egg.

Systematics and taxonomy

In 1892, Oskar Boettger described the new genus Cophixalus based on a species of frog that was found in the Kaiser-Wilhelms-Land colony in New Guinea , and which he named Cophixalus geislerorum after the people who discovered it, the Geisler brothers . Boettger cited the absence of the omosternum and procoracoid, including the collarbones, as the main features. In 1980, when the holotype described by Boettger was checked in the Senckenberg Nature Museum , it turned out that the specimen had been damaged in one section . Investigations of other specimens of the same species from the Natural History Museum in Vienna , caught by the Geisler brothers at the type locality, showed that these frogs definitely have small collarbones and cartilaginous procoracoid. However, these characteristics classify the species in the genus Oreophryne , which was also described by Boettger in 1895. Because of the priority rule , Cophixalus geislerorum would have become the type species of the genus Oreophryne , the species of which consequently should all have had the generic name Cophixalus . According to the rules of the ICZN, a new name should have been found for the earlier Cophixalus species . At the request of Menzies and others, the plenary of the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature decided that Cophixalus geislerorum should be transferred to the genus Oreophryne , but that this group should not be renamed. A new type species was designated for Cophixalus , this is Cophixalus verrucosus (Boulenger, 1898).

species

The genus Cophixalus includes 67 species.

As of July 30, 2019

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Darrel R. Frost: Cophixalus , Amphibian Species of the World, Version 6.0, American Museum of Natural History, 1998-2014, accessed March 14, 2014
  2. ↑ a b c Rainer Günther: Two new small Cophixalus species with reduced thumbs from the west of New Guinea (Anura: Microhylidae). Herpetozoa, 19, 1-2, pp. 59-75, Vienna, July 30, 2006
  3. ^ A b Oskar Boettger: Catalog of the Batrachier collection in the museum of the Senckenberg Natural Research Society in Frankfurt am Main . Frankfurt a. M. 1892
  4. ^ HW Parker: A monograph of the frogs of the family Microhylidae. British Museum (Natural History), London 1934
  5. ↑ Fred Kraus: Papuan frogs of the genus Cophixalus (Anura: Microhylidae): new synonyms, new species, and a dichotomous key. Zootaxa, 3559, pp. 1-36, 2012
  6. ↑ a b c Rainer Günther, Stephen Richards, Burhan Tjaturadi & Keliopas Krey: Two new species of the genus Cophixalus from the Raja Ampat Islands west of New Guinea (Amphibia, Anura, Microhylidae). Zoosystematics and Evolution, 91, 2, pp. 199-213, October 2015, doi : 10.3897 / zse.91.5411
  7. ^ Oskar Boettger: List of the reptiles and Batrachians of the island Halmaheira according to the collections of Prof. Dr. W. Kükenthals. Zoologischer Anzeiger, 18, pp. 129-138, 1895
  8. ↑ JI Menzies, MJ Tyler & RG Zweifel: Cophixalus Boettger 1892 (Amphibia, Salientia): proposed designation of type species under the plenary powers. ZN (S.) 2298. Bull. Zool. Nomenclature, 36, 4, pp. 231-235, London 1980
  9. ↑ a b Stephen Richards, Rainer Günther: Three new scansorial species of microhylid frogs (Anura: Cophixalus, Oreophryne) from Papua New Guinea. Salamandra, 55, pp. 55-72, 2019
  10. ^ Rainer Günther, SJ Richards & CS Dahl: Nine new species of microhylid frogs from the Muller Range in western Papua New Guinea (Anura, Microhylidae). Vertebrate Zoology, 64, pp. 59-94, May 2014

literature

  • Oskar Boettger: Catalog of the Batrachier collection in the Museum of the Senckenberg Natural Research Society in Frankfurt am Main . Frankfurt a. M. 1892
  • HW Parker: A monograph of the frogs of the family Microhylidae. British Museum (Natural History), London 1934
  • JI Menzies, MJ Tyler & RG Zweifel: Cophixalus Boettger 1892 (Amphibia, Salientia): proposed designation of type species under the plenary powers. ZN (S.) 2298. Bull. Zool. Nomenclature, 36, 4, pp. 231-235, London 1980

Web links

Commons : Cophixalus  - collection of images, videos and audio files