Two new surprising species of leaf-litter toad of the Rhinella margaritifera species group (Anura: Bufonidae) from the Peruvian Amazon, LoretoPeru.

We describe two new species of Rhinella (Anura: Bufonidae) from the department of Loreto, Peru. We integrate morphological and phylogenetic analyses to provide evidence of new species. R. angeli sp. nov. is diagnosable from all congeners by its pronounced fleshy proboscis and R. unapensis sp. nov. by the small size (mean snout-vent length=37.7 4.1 mm) of adult males, snout pointed in dorsal view, nearly acute in lateral view, and small bony protrusion at the angle of jaws among other characters. The two species are allopatric, where the first species is known to be associated inhabits upland (=terra firme) forests, while the second white sand forests (=varillales) around Iquitos city. The two new species represent the 20th and 21st species of the Rhinella margaritifera species group.

A new species of the Rhinella margaritifera (Laurenti 1768) species group (Anura, Bufonidae) from southern Brazilian Amazonia.

Neotropical toads from the Rhinella margaritifera species group have been considered a taxonomic puzzle for a long time. Because of the high morphological similarity and an unknown number of undescribed taxa among the species of this group, we did an extensive search for character distribution within all nominal taxa. Herein we describe Rhinella parecis sp. nov. a new species from Southern Brazilian Amazon. We provide a morphological diagnosis, morphometric comparisons with similar species, and a molecular phylogenetic hypothesis on the relationships of the new species. Rhinella parecis sp. nov. is assigned to the R. margaritifera group and differs from others species by snout-vent length ranging 40.7-53.5 mm in males (n=12) and 44.9-54.8 mm in females (n=4), snout rounded in dorsal view, acute with fleshy ridge extending to tip of snout in lateral view, canthal and pre-orbital crests absent, supra-orbital, parietal and supra-tympanic crests present and low, dorsolateral row of tubercles present, bony protrusion at the angle of jaws absent, tympanum evident, vertebral apophyses absent and toes half-webbed. The new species is the 20th species associated to the R. margaritifera group distributed in the Chapada dos Parecis, a probable center of endemism in states of Rondônia and Mato Grosso, Brazil.

The Amazonian Red Side-Necked Turtle Rhinemys rufipes (Spix, 1824) (Testudines, Chelidae) Has a GSD Sex-Determining Mechanism with an Ancient XY Sex Microchromosome System.

The Amazonian red side-necked turtle Rhynemis rufipes is an endemic Amazonian Chelidae species that occurs in small streams throughout Colombia and Brazil river basins. Little is known about various biological aspects of this species, including its sex determination strategies. Among chelids, the greatest karyotype diversity is found in the Neotropical species, with several 2n configurations, including cases of triploidy. Here, we investigate the karyotype of Rhinemys rufipes by applying combined conventional and molecular cytogenetic procedures. This allowed us to discover a genetic sex-determining mechanism that shares an ancestral micro XY sex chromosome system. This ancient micro XY system recruited distinct repeat motifs before it diverged from several South America and Australasian species. We propose that such a system dates back to the earliest lineages of the chelid species before the split of South America and Australasian lineages.

Redescription of the Amazonian tiny tree toad Amazophrynella minuta (Melin, 1941) (Anura: Bufonidae) from its type locality.

The description of Amazophrynella minuta was published in 1941 by the Swedish naturalist Douglas Melin based on material from Taracuá (Amazonas state, Brazil). This description was very brief and based on the morphology of few specimens with diagnostic characters and color variation not well defined. Moreover, the type series is currently in poor state of conservation. Consequently, taxonomic ambiguity surrounds the nominal taxon A. minuta, which hampers the description of many unnamed congeneric species. Herein, we redescribe A. minuta based on recently collected specimens from the type locality, designate a lectotype, formulate a new diagnosis, provide patterns of morphological variation, measurements and body proportions.

Description of the advertisement calls of four species of Amazophrynella (Anura:Bufonidae).

Amazophrynella comprises 11 small bufonid species with a pan-Amazonian distribution (Fouquet et al. 2012a, b; Rojas et al. 2016, Rojas et al. 2018). All species inhabit the forest leaf litter, breed in seasonal puddles and are diurnally and nocturnally active (Fouquet et al. 2012b; Rojas et al. 2014; 2015; 2016). Until now only one nominal species, A. javierbustamantei, and two putative lineages-A. moisesii (Rio Yuyapichis, Peru) and A. siona (Santa Cecilia, Ecuador)-had their advertisement calls formally described (Duellman 1978; Schlüter 1981; Rojas et al. 2016). Herein, we described for the first time the advertisement calls from additional four species of Amazophrynella.

A Pan-Amazonian species delimitation: high species diversity within the genus Amazophrynella (Anura: Bufonidae).

Amphibians are probably the most vulnerable group to climate change and climate-change associate diseases. This ongoing biodiversity crisis makes it thus imperative to improve the taxonomy of anurans in biodiverse but understudied areas such as Amazonia. In this study, we applied robust integrative taxonomic methods combining genetic (mitochondrial 16S, 12S and COI genes), morphological and environmental data to delimit species of the genus Amazophrynella (Anura: Bufonidae) sampled from throughout their pan-Amazonian distribution. Our study confirms the hypothesis that the species diversity of the genus is grossly underestimated. Our analyses suggest the existence of eighteen linages of which seven are nominal species, three Deep Conspecific Lineages, one Unconfirmed Candidate Species, three Uncategorized Lineages, and four Confirmed Candidate Species and described herein. We also propose a phylogenetic hypothesis for the genus and discuss its implications for historical biogeography of this Amazonian group.

The tadpole of Amazophrynella manaos Rojas, Carvalho, Gordo, Ávila, Farias and Hrbek, 2014 (Anura, Bufonidae) from the type locality and adjacent regions at Central Amazonia, Brazil.

The genus Amazophrynella, as currently recognized (Fouquet et al. 2012a, b), is represented by four nominal species (Frost 2014; Rojas et al. 2014) but the tadpoles of only one species, Amazophrynella minuta (Melin) from Ecuador, have been described (Duellman & Lynch 1969; Duellman 1978). Amazophrynella manaos Rojas, Carvalho, Gordo, Ávila, Farias and Hrbek, 2014 occurs in the leaf litter of terra firme forest in the southwestern part of the Brazilian Guiana region (Rojas et al. 2014). The tadpole of this species was briefly described in diagrammatic drawings by Hero (1990) as Dendrophryniscus minutus. Herein, we provide a detailed description of this tadpole based on individuals at 12 stages of development collected in five different sites, including the type locality, at Central Amazonia, Brazil.

A new species of Amazophrynella (Anura:Bufonidae) from the southwestern part of the Brazilian Guiana Shield.

Amazophrynella is a genus of the family Bufonidae, currently represented by three species. The type species of the genus, Amazophrynella minuta, however, is a complex of species occurring throughout the Amazonian biome. This group remains problematic taxonomically; the difficulty lays principally in the lack of diagnostic characters in the original description of A. minuta, the lack of molecular data and refined taxonomic comparison of individuals through its wide distribution. We describe a new species of the genus Amazophrynella, distributed in the southwestern part of the Guiana Shield of Brazil based on a series of morphological and molecular characters. The new species differs from others of the genus by presenting a slightly truncated triangular snout, ventral texture covered by many fine granules, white belly covered with black spots and by fifteen molecular autapomorphies in the 16S rDNA fragment. Uncorrected p-distances of a fragment of the 16S mitochondrial rDNA gene revealed high divergence among other Amazophrynella species (9%-14%). Additionally we provide a new diagnosis of topotypic material of Amazophrynella minuta including molecular data. Our results show the existence of a subestimated diversity in the genus Amazophrynella.