Abstract
Enzyme electrophoresis of three species of Pleurodema (38 specimens) collected from six sites in northwestern Argentina resolved 44 allozymes for 15 loci. Pleurodema cinerea and P. borellii, which are morphologically similar, are believed to be reproductively isolated by habitat differences. Although the genetic distance was smallest between the two P. borellii populations, P. borellii was not genetically distant from P. cinerea (average values for Nei's and Rogers' intersite genetic distance indices (D) were 0.155 and 0.229, respectively). Pleurodema tucumana was genetically distant from both P. cinerea and P. borellii (average Nei's D = 1.918; average Rogers' D = 0.799). A comparison of mating calls also suggested that P. cinerea and P. borellii are very similar to each other. The calls of P. borellii and P. cinerea differed only in average pulse rate (100.4 and 59.9 pulses per second, respectively) but this difference may have been temperature related. No conclusive evidence was found in this study to indicate that P. cinerea and P. borellii are distinct species.
Published Version
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