Submitted by GEANE LIMEIRA DA SILVA, SERGIO LUIZ DA SILVA MUNIZ, and EDNILZA MARANHAO DOS SANTOS, Universidade Federal Rural de Pernambuco / Unidade Acadêmica de Serra Talhada (UFRPE / UAST) Fazenda Saco, S/N, Serra Talhada, PE, Brazil (e-mail:
[email protected]).
Dendrophryniscus carvalhoi (Carvalho’s Tree Toad). Defensive Behavior. Thanatosis is a defensive behavior by which an animal feigns death to escape predation. As many predators pursue only live prey, this behavior may be very effective. The genus Dendrophryniscus is native to South America occurring in the Atlantic Rainforests of Brazil, Amazonian Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Brazil, and at Guianas (Frost 2009. Amphibian Species of the World: an Online Reference. Version 5.3 accessed 12 Feb. 2009. Electronic database accessible at http:// research.amnh.org /herpetology/amphibia/. American Museum of Natural History, New York). Dendrophryniscus carvalhoi is known from the type locality in Santa Tereza municipality and ca. 130 km SW at the Parque Nacional do Caparaó, both in Espírito Santo state, Brazil (Cassimiro et al. 2008. Herpetol. Rev. 39:362). Herein we describe thanatosis in D. carvalhoi. During a herpetological survey between 27 Oct and 3 Nov 2006, in Parque Nacional do Caparaó, Fazenda Pico da Bandeira, Santa Marta municipality, Minas Gerais State (20.467222°S, 41.733889°W; WGS 84; elev. ca. 1135 m), we observed defensive behavior of D. carvalhoi. One individual displayed thanatosis with stiff-leg behavior in response to hand capture. This species defends itself by stiffening its legs in the same way as was recently described for D. brevipollicatus and D. leucomystax (Bertoluci et al. 2007. Alytes 25:61–67). The frog assumes the stiff-legged posture when touched and remains immobile for almost one minute. Other specimens collected when disturbed for the first time in the field assumed this same behavior, and also sometimes under laboratory conditions. Thanathosis with stiff-leg behavior maybe more common than previously thought and widespread among frogs living in forest litter. The behavior may be underestimated considering that certain species only exhibit thanathosis under specific conditions, with predator-specific responses (Gibbons and Gibbons 2009. Herpetol. Rev. 40:440). Moreover, the congruence among thanathosis behaviors among different species of Dendrophryniscus (Bertoluci et al. 2007, op. cit.; Russell 2002. Herpetol. Rev. 33:302) may reflect a closer relationship among D. leucomystax, D. brevipollicatus, and D. carvalhoi relative to D. minutus, in which thanathosis involves flipping over and presenting the ventral surface (Bertoluci et al. 2007, op. cit.; Russell, op. cit.). We thank Lilian Duarte de Matos, and our field guide Paraíba, for field assistance. The Instituto Brasileiro do Meio Ambiente e dos Recursos Naturais Renováveis (IBAMA) provided support 472
and collecting permits (numbers 185/2005, and 238/2006). Estevão José Marchesini Fonseca, Director of the Parque Nacional do Caparaó, provided lodging facilities and support. Submitted by JOSÉ CASSIMIRO (e-mail: geckoides@usp. br), Vanessa Kruth Verdade (e-mail: vverdade@gmail. com), Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC), Centro de Ciências Naturais e Humanas (CCNH); and Miguel Trefaut Rodrigues, Departamento de Zoologia, Instituto de Biociências, Universidade de São Paulo, Caixa Postal 11.461, CEP 05422-970, São Paulo, SP, Brazil (e-mail:
[email protected]).
Euphlyctis cyanophlyctis (Indian Skipper Frog). Albinism. During field collections, we observed two albino tadpoles of Euphlyctis cyanophlyctis, one at an early stage of development (Gosner Stage 28; 31 mm in length; Gosner 1960. Herpetologica 16:183–190) and the other near metamorphosis (Gosner Stage 43; 61.8 mm in length) in a pond on the University of Pune Campus (18.554925°N, 73.86335°E), Maharashtra, India. These tadpoles were present with large numbers of conspecifics having normal pigmentation and were very conspicuous. The tadpoles were unique in that they had golden yellow color throughout and had no black pigmentation (Fig. 1A) compared to the normal tadpoles (Fig. 1B). In the early stage tadpole, although black pigmentation was absent throughout the body, the oral appara-
Color reproduction supported by the Thomas Beauvais Fund
poles and images of the predation were deposited in the Herpetological Collection of Universidade Federal Rural de Pernambuco / Unidade Acadêmica de Serra Talhada - UFRPE / UAST (Lot 31), Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil. We thank Mr. A. Timóteo for authorization to collect the data, Pibic for a scholarship, and IBAMA for the license #11218-1.
Fig. 1. Albino tadpoles of Euphlyctis cyanophlyctis along with normal tadpoles at different stages of larval development.
Herpetological Review 41(4), 2010
