A tiny new species of Platypelis from the Marojejy National Park in northeastern Madagascar (Amphibia: Microhylidae)

Frank Glaw,Jörn Köhler,Miguel Vences

doi:10.5852/ejt.2012.9

Abstract

We describe a tiny new frog species of the genus Platypelis (Anura: Microhylidae: Cophylinae) from Marojejy National Park, northeastern Madagascar. Platypelis ravus sp. nov. differs from all other known Platypelis and Cophyla species by its small size (17-19 mm snout-vent length) and a combination of other morphological and bioacoustic characters. The new species seems to be most closely related to P. milloti with which it shares the principal colour pattern, but exhibits a yellow rather than red posterior venter. Uncorrected pairwise sequence divergence in a 16S rRNA gene fragment to all other known species of the genus (except P. cowanii for which no genetic data is available) is greater than 6%. We suggest the inclusion of the new species in the IUCN threat category “Data Deficient”.

Highlights

Narrow-mouthed frogs, family Microhylidae Günther, 1858, are a species-rich clade of almost cosmopolitan distribution and only partly clarified phylogenetic relationships (Van Bocxlaer et al 2006; Van der Meijden et al 2007; Kurabayashi et al 2011)
We describe a tiny new frog species of the genus Platypelis (Anura: Microhylidae: Cophylinae) from Marojejy National Park, northeastern Madagascar
Phylogenetic analyses (Wollenberg et al 2008) placed the new species with some confidence sister to P. milloti. At first glance these two species are very distinctive in numerous characters, including size and advertisement calls, it is interesting that they bear some similarities in the dorsal colour pattern

Summary

Introduction

Narrow-mouthed frogs, family Microhylidae Günther, 1858, are a species-rich clade of almost cosmopolitan distribution and only partly clarified phylogenetic relationships (Van Bocxlaer et al 2006; Van der Meijden et al 2007; Kurabayashi et al 2011). Madagascar’s microhylids are classified in three endemic subfamilies, Cophylinae Cope, 1889, Dyscophinae Boulenger, 1882 and Scaphiophryninae Laurent, 1946 (Blommers-Schlösser & Blanc 1991) of which the Cophylinae is by far the most speciesrich group and sister to the Scaphiophryninae (Van der Meijden et al 2007). 1892 (11 species), Cophyla Boettger, 1880 (3 species), Madecassophryne Guibé, 1974 (1 species), Platypelis Boulenger, 1882 (10 species), Plethodontohyla Boulenger, 1882 (10 species), Rhombophryne Boettger, 1880 (10 species), and Stumpffia Boettger, 1881 (13 species). These frogs have radiated into a variety of niches and contain arboreal, terrestrial and fossorial frogs (Andreone et al 2005; Wollenberg et al 2008). Field surveys and molecular assessments of diversity (e.g. Vieites et al 2009) have provided evidence that the species inventory of the cophylines is far from being completed, and a large number of undescribed candidate species is known from most of the cophyline genera

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Conclusion