Rhacophorus
Rhacophorus is a genus of frogs in the shrub frog family (Rhacophoridae) which together with the related Hylidae makes up the true tree frogs. They are found in India, Japan, Madagascar, Africa, and Southeast Asia. Over forty species are currently recognised.[1]
| Rhacophorus | |
|---|---|
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| Malabar gliding frog (Rhacophorus malabaricus) Note the elongated toes with prominent webbing. | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Amphibia |
| Order: | Anura |
| Family: | Rhacophoridae |
| Subfamily: | Rhacophorinae |
| Genus: | Rhacophorus Kuhl & Hasselt, 1822 |
| Species | |
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See text | |
| Synonyms | |
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These frogs have long toes with strong webbing between them, enabling the animals to slow their fall to a glide, a form of arboreal locomotion known as 'parachuting'.[2] They are therefore among the anurans commonly known as "flying frogs".
The present genus is closely related to Polypedates, which in former times was often included in Rhacophorus. Even today, it is not fully resolved in which of these genera "P." feae and the Chinese flying frog ("R." dennysi) properly belong, and the supposedly new species "P. pingbianensis" has turned out to be the same as R. duboisi.
Reproduction
These frogs lay their eggs in aerial foam nests; upon hatching, tadpoles drop to the water under the nest and complete their development there.[3][4]
Species
The following species are recognised in the genus Rhacophorus:[1][5]
- Rhacophorus annamensis Smith, 1924 – Annam flying frog
- Rhacophorus baluensis Inger, 1954
- Rhacophorus barisani Harvey, Pemberton, and Smith, 2002
- Rhacophorus bengkuluensis Streicher, Hamidy, Harvey, Anders, Shaney, Kurniawan, and Smith, 2014
- Rhacophorus bifasciatus Van Kampen, 1923
- Rhacophorus bipunctatus Ahl, 1927 (including R. htunwini)
- Rhacophorus borneensis Matsui, Shimada, and Sudin, 2013
- Rhacophorus calcadensis Ahl, 1927 – Kalakad gliding frog
- Rhacophorus calcaneus Smith, 1924
- Rhacophorus catamitus Harvey, Pemberton, and Smith, 2002
- Rhacophorus edentulus Müller, 1894
- Rhacophorus exechopygus Inger, Orlov, and Darevsky, 1999
- Rhacophorus georgii Roux, 1904
- Rhacophorus helenae Rowley, Tran, Hoang & Le, 2012[5] – Helen's tree frog
- Rhacophorus hoabinhensis Nguyen, Pham, Nguyen, Ninh, and Ziegler, 2017
- Rhacophorus hoanglienensis Orlov, Lathrop, Murphy, and Ho, 2001
- Rhacophorus indonesiensis Hamidy & Kurniati, 2015
- Rhacophorus kio Ohler & Delorme, 2005 – black-webbed treefrog
- Rhacophorus laoshan Mo, Jiang, Xie, and Ohler, 2008
- Rhacophorus larissae Ostroshabov, Orlov, and Nguyen, 2013
- Rhacophorus lateralis Boulenger, 1883
- Rhacophorus malabaricus Jerdon, 1870 – Malabar gliding frog
- Rhacophorus margaritifer (Schlegel, 1837)
- Rhacophorus marmoridorsum Orlov, 2008
- Rhacophorus modestus Boulenger, 1920
- Rhacophorus monticola Boulenger, 1896
- Rhacophorus nigropalmatus Boulenger, 1895 – Wallace's flying frog
- Rhacophorus norhayatii Chan and Grismer, 2010
- Rhacophorus orlovi Ziegler and Köhler, 2001
- Rhacophorus pardalis Günther, 1858 – harlequin tree frog
- Rhacophorus poecilonotus Boulenger, 1920
- Rhacophorus pseudomalabaricus Vasudevan and Dutta, 2000
- Rhacophorus reinwardtii (Schlegel, 1840) – black-webbed tree frog, green flying frog, Reinwardt's tree frog
- Rhacophorus rhodopus Liu and Hu, 1960 (including R. namdaphaensis, often included in R. bipunctatus)
- Rhacophorus robertingeri Orlov, Poyarkov, Vassilieva, Ananjeva, Nguyen, Sang, and Geissler, 2012
- Rhacophorus spelaeus Orlov, Gnophanxay, Phimminith, and Phomphoumy, 2010
- Rhacophorus subansiriensis Mathew and Sen, 2009
- Rhacophorus translineatus Wu, 1977
- Rhacophorus tuberculatus (Anderson, 1871)
- Rhacophorus turpes Smith, 1940
- Rhacophorus vampyrus Rowley, Le, Thi, Stuart, and Hoang, 2010 – vampire tree frog
- Rhacophorus vanbanicus Kropachev, Orlov, Ninh, and Nguyen, 2019
- Rhacophorus verrucopus Huang, 1983
- Rhacophorus viridimaculatus Ostroshabov, Orlov, and Nguyen, 2013
Phylogeny
The following is a partial phylogeny of Rhacophorus from Pyron & Wiens (2011).[6] Only nine species are included. Rhacophorus is a sister group of Polypedates.[6]
| Rhacophorus |
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References
- Frost, Darrel R. (2013). "Rhacophorus". Amphibian Species of the World 5.6, an Online Reference. American Museum of Natural History. Retrieved 15 April 2013.
- John R. Hutchinson. "Gliding and Parachuting". www.ucmp.berkeley.edu. Regents of the University of California.
- Grosjean, S.; Delorme, M.; Dubois, A.; Ohler, A. (2008). "Evolution of reproduction in the Rhacophoridae (Amphibia, Anura)". Journal of Zoological Systematics and Evolutionary Research. 46 (2): 169. doi:10.1111/j.1439-0469.2007.00451.x.
- Li, Jiatang; Dingqi Rao; Robert W. Murphy; Yaping Zhang (2011). "The systematic status of rhacophorid frogs" (PDF). Asian Herpetological Research. 2: 1–11. doi:10.3724/SP.J.1245.2011.00001.
- Rowley, J. J. L.; Tran, D. T. A.; Hoang, H. D.; Le, D. T. T. (2012). "A new species of large flying frog (Rhacophoridae: Rhacophorus) from lowland forests in southern Vietnam". Journal of Herpetology. 46 (4): 480–487. doi:10.1670/11-261.
- R. Alexander Pyron; John J. Wiens (2011). "A large-scale phylogeny of Amphibia including over 2800 species, and a revised classification of extant frogs, salamanders, and caecilians". Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. 61 (2): 543–583. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2011.06.012. PMID 21723399.
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