A new large canopy-dwelling species of Phyllodytes Wagler, 1930 (Anura, Hylidae) from the Atlantic Forest of the state of Bahia, Northeastern Brazil

Iuri R Dias; Gabriel Novaes-E-Fagundes; Antonio Mollo Neto; Juliana Zina; Caroline Garcia; Renato Sousa Recoder; Francisco Dal Vechio; Miguel Trefaut Rodrigues; Mirco Solé

doi:10.7717/peerj.8642

A new large canopy-dwelling species of Phyllodytes Wagler, 1930 (Anura, Hylidae) from the Atlantic Forest of the state of Bahia, Northeastern Brazil

PeerJ. 2020 Jun 23:8:e8642. doi: 10.7717/peerj.8642. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Iuri R Dias¹, Gabriel Novaes-E-Fagundes¹, Antonio Mollo Neto², Juliana Zina³, Caroline Garcia³, Renato Sousa Recoder², Francisco Dal Vechio², Miguel Trefaut Rodrigues², Mirco Solé^{1

4}

Affiliations

¹ Programa de Pós-Graduação em Zoologia, Universidade Estadual de Santa Cruz, Ilhéus, Bahia, Brazil.
² Instituto de Biociências, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil.
³ Departamento de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Estadual do Sudoeste da Bahia, Jequié, Bahia, Brazil.
⁴ Herpetology Section, Zoologisches Forschungsmuseum Alexander Koenig, Bonn, Germany.

Abstract

The known diversity of treefrogs of the genus Phyllodytes has rapidly increased in recent years, currently comprising 14 species. Recent field work in the Atlantic Rainforest of the state of Bahia lead to the discovery of a new large species of Phyllodytes which is herein described based on multiple evidence including morphological, acoustical and genetic data. Phyllodytes sp. nov. is one of the largest species within the genus and presents immaculate yellowish dorsum and limbs. The advertisement call of the species is composed of 7-31 notes (half pulsed/pulsatile-half harmonic) with frequency-modulated harmonics. Phyllodytes sp. nov. has a karyotype of 2n = 22 chromosomes, as also found in other species of the genus. Genetic distance values of the 16S mitochondrial rRNA among Phyllodytes sp. nov. and its congeners range between 6.4 to 10.2%. The description of another new species for this state reinforces the need for further taxonomic work with Phyllodytes in this region that has been revealed as a priority area for research and conservation of this genus.

Keywords: Amphibia; Biodiversity; Bromeliad; Integrative taxonomy; Lophyohylini.

Grants and funding

Scholarships were provided by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior and Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq–Project: 406899/2017-7, process: 167387/2017-0 and 155198/2018-1) to Iuri Ribeiro Dias. Scholarships were provided by Fundação de Amparo á Pesquisa do Estado da Bahia (FAPESB; No BOL1767/2013) and by CAPES (masters degree scholarship between 2016–2017) to Gabriel Novaes e Fagundes. Mirco Solé was funded by a “Bolsa de Produtividade em Pesquisa” (CNPq–304999/2015–6), a “Universal” project (CNPq–449930/2014–9) and a “PROTAX” project (CNPq–440615/2015–1). Fundação O Boticário de Proteção à Natureza (0991_20132) funded this study. Miguel Trefaut Rodrigues received funding from the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (project 2011/50146-6) and CNPq. Antonio Mollo Neto received funding from Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (project 2017/15025-0). There was no additional external funding received for this study. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.