Mud diver

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Mud diver
Western mud diver (Pelodytes punctatus)

Western mud diver ( Pelodytes punctatus )

Systematics
Row : Land vertebrates (Tetrapoda)
without rank: Amphibians (Lissamphibia)
Order : Frog (anura)
Superfamily : Pelodytoidea
Family : Pelodytidae
Genre : Mud diver
Scientific name of the  family
Pelodytidae
Bonaparte , 1850
Scientific name of the  genus
Pelodytes
Bonaparte, 1838

The mud divers ( Pelodytes ) are small frogs and form the only genus of the family of the Pelodytidae, also called mud divers in German . This consists of only five known species with occurrences on the one hand in southwest and western Europe, on the other hand in the eastern Black Sea and Caucasus regions.

Together with the American shovel feet , the mud divers form the superfamily Pelodytoidea , which in turn represents the sister group of the toad frogs (Pelobatoidea) from European and Asian toad frogs . So the closest European relatives are paddock toads like the common toad .

features

The head-torso length of the mud divers is roughly four to five centimeters, comparable to that of the European tree frog or the toad . In addition, they have relatively long hind legs, a flat head and vertically slit pupils (or those with a round shape and a vertical "central axis"). On their smooth-skinned to granular warty upper side there is usually a pattern of olive-greenish spots or dots. The males have paired internal vocal sacs and the females cling to the amplexus in the lumbar region.

Way of life

Mud divers have a more terrestrial way of life. During the mating season, however, they seek out bodies of water in which they deposit spawning portions in the form of very short strings or as slimy bags on water plants. The tadpoles are strikingly large in relation to the body size of adult animals.

Species and their distribution

The genus Pelodytes and at the same time the entire family Pelodytidae consists of only five known species, of which the Iberian mud diver was only separated from the western mud diver as a separate species in 2000 and the cryptic species Pelodytes atlanticus from the Portuguese Atlantic coast and Pelodytes hespericus from the central and eastern Spain were only described in spring 2017:

One species is widespread in Western Europe, three species occur only on the Iberian Peninsula . The fifth species ( P. caucasicus ), on the other hand, with its occurrence in the Caucasus and the eastern side of the Black Sea, is remarkably far separated from the others. The speciation was herein by spatial isolation due to the glacial promoted.

For the sake of completeness, it should be mentioned that the name Pelodytes was also used by individual authors in the 19th century for two current representatives of the genus Litoria ( Australian tree frogs ) and for the genus Pseudotriton of the lungless salamanders .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Jesus Diaz-Rodriguez et al .: Integration of molecular, bioacoustical and morphological data reveals two new cryptic species of Pelodytes (Anura, Pelodytidae) from the Iberian Peninsula. Zootaxa, Vol 4243, No 1, DOI: 10.11646 / zootaxa.4243.1.1
  2. ↑ Darrel R. Frost: Pelodytidae Bonaparte, 1850 ( Memento of the original from June 12, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , In: Amphibian Species of the World: an Online Reference. Version 6.0. American Museum of Natural History, New York 2016. Retrieved June 12, 2016 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / research.amnh.org

literature

  • Andreas Nöllert & Christel Nöllert: The amphibians of Europe . Franckh-Kosmos, Stuttgart 1992, ISBN 3-440-06340-2

Web links

Commons : Mud Diver  - Collection of images, videos and audio files