Shining like a diamond: A new species of diamond frog from northern
Madagascar

Date:
June 16, 2020
Source:
Pensoft Publishers
Summary:
Despite the active ongoing taxonomic progress on the Madagascar
frogs, the amphibian inventory of this hyper-diverse island is
still very far from being complete. More new species are constantly
being discovered, often within already well-studied areas. So, in
one of the relatively well-studied parks in northern Madagascar, a
new species of diamond frog, Rhombophryne ellae, was found in 2017.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Despite the active ongoing taxonomic progress on Madagascar's frogs, the amphibian inventory of this hyper-diverse island is still very far from
being complete. The known diversity of the diamond frog genus Rhombophryne
in Madagascar has increased significantly (more than doubled!) over the
last 10 years, but still there are several undescribed candidate species awaiting description. New species are constantly being discovered in Madagascar, often even within already well-studied areas. One such place
is the Montagne d'Ambre National Park in northern Madagascar.


========================================================================== Montagne d'Ambre National Park is widely known for its endemic flora and
fauna, waterfalls and crater lakes, and considered to be a relatively well-studied area. Yet, only two studies have been published so far on
the reptiles and amphibians of the Park.

Serving the pursuit of knowledge of the herpetofauna in the region,
Germany- based herpetologist Dr. Mark D. Scherz (Bavarian State Collection
of Zoology, Technical University of Braunschweig, University of Konstanz) published a description of a new diamond frog species: Rhombophryne ellae,
in the open- access journal Zoosystematics and Evolution.

"As soon as I saw this frog, I knew it was a new species," shares
Dr. Scherz, "The orange flash-markings on the legs and the large black
spots on the hip made it immediately obvious to me. During my Master's
and PhD research, I studied this genus and described several species,
and there are no described species with such orange legs, and only few
species have these black markings on the hip. It's rare that we find
a frog and are immediately able to recognise that it is a new species
without having to wait for the DNA sequence results to come back, so this
was elating." The new species is most closely related to a poorly-known
and still undescribed species from Tsaratanana in northern Madagascar,
but is otherwise quite different from all other diamond frogs. With the
orange colouration on its legs, Rhombophryne ellae joins the growing list
of frogs that have red to orange flash-markings. The function of this
striking colouration remains unknown, despite having evolved repeatedly
in frogs, including numerous times in Madagascar's narrow-mouthed
frogs alone.

"The discovery of such a distinctive species within a comparatively
well- studied park points towards the gaps in our knowledge of the
amphibians of the tropics. It also highlights the role that bad weather, especially cyclones, can play in bringing otherwise hidden frogs out of
hiding -- Rhombophryne ellae was caught just as Cyclone Ava was moving
in on Madagascar, and several other species my colleagues and I have
recently described were also caught under similar cyclonic conditions,"
says Dr. Scherz.

The species is known so far only from a single specimen, making it
difficult to estimate its conservation status. Yet, based on the status
of other, related frogs from the same area, it will probably be Red-listed
as Near Threatened due to its presumably small range and micro-endemicity.


========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by Pensoft_Publishers. The original
story is licensed under a Creative_Commons_License. Note: Content may
be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Mark D. Scherz. Diamond frogs forever: a new species of Rhombophryne
Boettger, 1880 (Microhylidae, Cophylinae) from Montagne d'Ambre
National Park, northern Madagascar. Zoosystematics and Evolution,
2020; 96 (2): 313 DOI: 10.3897/zse.96.51372 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/06/200616083356.htm

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