Rana cerigensis Beerli, Hotz, Tunner, Heppich, and Uzzell 1994

Introduction

Excerpt of the original description (Beerli et al. 1994):

A member of the western Palearctic water frog group, distinguished from the Palearctic brown frog group by paired external lateral vocal sacs in males, extension of webbing of feet to the toe tips, absence of a black face mask from the eye to the tympanum, and presence of dark mottling on the inner thigh surfaces; distinguished from the eastern Palearctic water frog group by protein electrophoresis: among the loci sharing no alleles with eastern Palearctic water frogs, those at aGDH, LDH-B, sMDH, MPI, and 6PGDH are shared with one to several species of western Palearctic water frogs, whereas those at LDH-A, mMDH, and sSOD are shared with all.

Rana cerigensis is discriminated from all other western Palearctic water frog species by a unique multilocus combination of electrophoretically detected alleles: among alleles shared with other species, our samples are fixed for mACO b, sACO b, ALB b, CK-A b, EST-6 b, [[alpha]]GDH b, GPI d, sIDH b, mIDH c, LDH-B a, sMDH b, MPI q; 6PGDH e, PGM-2 d, sSOD a. Except that they segregate in the water frog population of Rhodos, Rana cerigensis has unique alleles, fixed in our sample, for sAAT (l) and AHH (c).

Morphologically, among western Palearctic water frogs Rana cerigensis is medium-sized (mean ± SD of body length 54.5±12.2 mm for 8 adults). Tibia relatively long (body length/tibia length 1.85±0.08, N=8). Callus internus relatively short (body length/callus internus length 18.5±2.2, N=7), of medium height (callus length/height 3.2±0.3, N=3). Digitus primus medium-sized (body length/digitus primus length 7.4±1.1, N=7; digitus primus length/callus internus length 2.5±0.3, N=7). Dorsal coloration light brownish gray to olive, with or without light brown spots. No vertebral stripe in our samples. Venter cream-colored with gray mottling. Vocal sacs of males dark gray.

Distribution

The distribution of this species is restricted to Karpathos and Rhodos (Greece). It is the only water frog species known so far on these islands. Problems concerning Rhodos are discussed in Beerli 1994

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Voice

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Synonyms

Valid name: Rana (Pelophylax) cerigensis Beerli, Hotz, Tunner, Heppich, and Uzzell 1994
Synonyms: -

References

Beerli, P. 1994. Genetic isolation and calibration of an average protein clock in western Palearctic water frogs of the Aegean region. Dissertation Universität Zürich 1994. [Summary]

Beerli H. Hotz, H. Tunner, S. Heppich, and T. Uzzell. 1994. Two new water frog species from the Aegean islands Crete and Karpathos (Amphibia, Salientia, Ranidae). Notulae Naturae, Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 470:1-9.

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