IRCF REPTILES & AMPHIBIANS • 24(3):193–196 • DEC 2017

New Distribution Record and Intergeneric Amplexus in the Malabar Tree Toad, Pedostibes tuberculosus Günther 1875

(Amphibia: Anura: Bufonidae)Amit Sayyed and Abhijit Nale

Wildlife Protection and Research Society, India (amitsayyedsatara@gmail.com & abhijeetnale443@gmail.com)

Photographs by the senior author.

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IRCF REPTILES & AMPHIBIANS • VOL15, NO 4 • DEC 2008 189TABLE OF CONTENTS

T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S

F E A T U R E A R T I C L E S

Chasing Bullsnakes (Pituophis catenifer sayi) in Wisconsin: On the Road to Understanding the Ecology and Conservation of the Midwest’s Giant Serpent ...................... Joshua M. Kapfer 190

The Shared History of Treeboas (Corallus grenadensis) and Humans on Grenada: A Hypothetical Excursion ............................................................................................................................Robert W. Henderson 198

R E S E A R C H A R T I C L E S

The Texas Horned Lizard in Central and Western Texas ....................... Emily Henry, Jason Brewer, Krista Mougey, and Gad Perry 204 The Knight Anole (Anolis equestris) in Florida

.............................................Brian J. Camposano, Kenneth L. Krysko, Kevin M. Enge, Ellen M. Donlan, and Michael Granatosky 212

C O N S E R V A T I O N A L E R T

World’s Mammals in Crisis ............................................................................................................................................................. 220 More Than Mammals ...................................................................................................................................................................... 223 The “Dow Jones Index” of Biodiversity ........................................................................................................................................... 225

H U S B A N D R Y

Captive Care of the Central Netted Dragon ....................................................................................................... Shannon Plummer 226

P R O F I L E

Kraig Adler: A Lifetime Promoting Herpetology ................................................................................................ Michael L. Treglia 234

C O M M E N T A R Y

The Turtles Have Been Watching Me ........................................................................................................................ Eric Gangloff 238

B O O K R E V I E W

Threatened Amphibians of the World edited by S.N. Stuart, M. Hoffmann, J.S. Chanson, N.A. Cox, R. Berridge, P. Ramani, and B.E. Young .............................................................................................................. Robert Powell 243

CONSERVATION RESEARCH REPORTS: Summaries of Published Conservation Research Reports ................................. 245 NATURAL HISTORY RESEARCH REPORTS: Summaries of Published Reports on Natural History ................................. 247 NEWBRIEFS ...................................................................................................................................................................................... 248 EDITORIAL INFORMATION ..................................................................................................................................................... 251 FOCUS ON CONSERVATION: A Project You Can Support ............................................................................................... 252

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The Malabar Tree Toad (Pedostibes tuberculosus) was ini-tially described by Günther in 1875 from Kerala, India.

The body is slender, the head of moderate size, snout pointed, lores vertical, fingers moderate, depressed, and webbed at the base, the first finger is half the length of the second, toes are

almost entirely webbed, and tips of both fingers and toes are dilated into broad, truncated disks that are smaller on the toes, and the tubercle near the joint is small, with two small, flat metatarsal tubercles. Coloration in life is brownish above, sides are dark with white bands running from below the eyes

Fig. 1. Malabar Tree Toad (Pedostibes tuberculosus) at the Koyna Wildlife Sanctuary, Satara District, Maharashtra, India (elevation 921.5 m).

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to the axilla, an additional white, longitudinal band in the lumbar region, and a dark-spotted venter. Pedostibes tuberculosus is endemic to the Western Ghats of India. It is listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List (Biju et al. 2004). The species had not been reported from any part of its known range for a span of more than 100 years since its description until it was rediscovered in 1980 by S.K. Bhattacharya in the Silent Valley National Park (Pillai 1986). It subsequently has been reported from various loca-tions in the southern Western Ghats: Palakkad, Ponmudi, Thiruvananthapuram, Vannathimala, Wayanad, the Aralam Wildlife Sanctuary, and Kannur in Kerala; the Cotegao Wildlife Sanctuary, Mollem Goa, Kalakkad, Tirunelveli Tamil Nadu, and at Jakkanagadde, the Sharavathi River basin, Shimoga, and Kudremukh National Park in Karnataka (Dahanukar et al. 2004; Gururaja and Ramachandra 2006; Dinesh and Radhakrishnan 2008). On 18 August 2016, we encountered Pedostibes tuber-culosus (Fig. 1) during an amphibian survey at the Koyna Wildlife Sanctuary, Satara District, Maharashtra at an eleva-tion of 921.5 m. This is the first report of the species from Maharashtra. Extensive field surveys are needed to better understand the distribution of these toads in the north-ern Western Ghats; they also are likely to occur within the Koyna Wildlife Sanctuary, as well as Chandoli National Park,

Radhanagari, and in parts of Amboli and the Tilari region of Maharashtra. Rainfall was continuous during the survey. At 1930 h males were calling from the trees, on the ground, and from the edges of a pond; we recorded calls with a PCM recorder 44 at 100 Hz. The small population was restricted to the immediate vicinity of the small natural pond near a stream, which was surrounded with large trees in dense forest. We observed a few amplecting pairs (Fig. 2), eggs laid at the edges of the pond (Fig. 3), and noted the presence of three other anuran species: Ghate’s Shrub Frogs (Raorchestes ghatei) and widely distributed Common Indian Treefrogs (Polypedates maculatus) and Asian Common Toads (Duttaphrynus melanostictus). During that same survey, we noticed intergeneric amplexus of P. tuberculosus and D. melanostictus. In the first instance, a male P. tuberculosus was in amplexus with a female D. melanostictus (Fig. 4). A second sighting involved two male P. tuberculosus attempting to mate with a single female D. melanostictus (Fig. 5). Sayyed (2013) had reported intergeneric amplexus when a male Malabar Gliding Frog (Rhacophorus malabaricus) attempted to mate with a female Polypedates mac-ulatus. A photograph on social media shows a male Kalakkad Treefrog (Rhacophorus calcadensis) in amplexus with a female R. malabaricus (P. Manoj, 2015, https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1159696284047865&set=a.7305917736

IRCF REPTILES & AMPHIBIANS • 24(3):193–196 • DEC 2017SAYYED AND NALE

Fig. 2. Amplecting pairs of Malabar Tree Toads (Pedostibes tuberculosus) at the Koyna Wildlife Sanctuary, Satara District, Maharashtra, India.

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IRCF REPTILES & AMPHIBIANS • 24(3):193–196 • DEC 2017SAYYED AND NALE

Fig. 4. Intergeneric amplexus between a male Malabar Tree Toad (Pedostibes tuberculosus) and a female Asian Common Toad (Duttaphrynus melanostictus).

Fig. 3. Eggs of the Malabar Tree Toad (Pedostibes tuberculosus) laid at the edge of a pond in the Koyna Wildlife Sanctuary, Satara District, Maharashtra, India.

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IRCF REPTILES & AMPHIBIANS • 24(3):193–196 • DEC 2017SAYYED AND NALE

24987.1073741847.100000225146691&type=3&permPage=1). Such observations suggest that attempted interspecific amplexus between congeners and even confamilial species is a relatively common event. Contributing factors could be stress triggered by competition for breeding sites or even a dispro-portionate number of females at some locations. However, males of many anuran species often are indiscriminant when mating (e.g., Engeler and Reyer 2001), and these records might merely illustrate that lack of selectivity and should not be construed as hybridization between the species involved.

AcknowledgmentsWe thank Dr. K.V. Gururaja for helpful suggestions, and Devendra Bhosle and Ashitosh Suryavanshi, members of the Wildlife Protection and Research Society, for help with fieldwork.

Literature CitedBiju, S.D., S. Dutta, R. Inger and V.A. Gour-Broome. 2004. Pedostibes tuberculosus.

The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2004: e.T16470A5918772.

Dahanukar, N., A.D. Padhye, G.P. Salelkar, and H.V. Ghate. 2004. Aktueller Beleg für die Malabar Baumkröte, Pedostibes tuberculosus Gunther, 1876, in Indien. Sauria 26(3): 17–20.

Dinesh, K.P. and C. Radhakrishnan. 2008. New site records of the Malabar Tree Toad, Pedostibes tuberculosus Gunther (Amphibia: Anura: Bufonidae), in Western Ghats, India. Records of the Zoological Survey of India 108: 13–15.

Engeler, B. and H.-U. Reyer. 2001. Choosy females and indiscriminate males: Mate choice in mixed populations of sexual and hybridogenetic water frogs (Rana lessonae, Rana esculenta). Behavioral Ecology 12: 600–606.

Gururaja, K.V. and T.V. Ramachandra. 2006. Pedostibes tuberculosus (Malabar Tree Toad). Advertisement call and distribution. Herpetological Review 37: 75–76.

Sayyed, A. 2013. Note on the natural crossbreeding in Family Rhacophoridae, Anura, Amphibia. Ela Journal 2(3): 7–9.

Pillai, R.S. 1986. Amphibian fauna of Silent Valley, Kerala, S. India. Records of the Zoological Survey of India 84: 229–242.

Fig. 5. Attempted intergeneric amplexus of two male Malabar Tree Toads (Pedostibes tuberculosus) and a female Asian Common Toad (Duttaphrynus melanostictus).