Aglyptodactylus laticeps Glaw, Vences & Böhme, 1998

Köhler, Jörn, Glaw, Frank, Pabijan, Maciej & Vences, Miguel, 2015, Integrative taxonomic revision of mantellid frogs of the genus Aglyptodactylus (Anura: Mantellidae), Zootaxa 4006 (3), pp. 401-438 : 416-417

Aglyptodactylus laticeps Glaw, Vences & Böhme, 1998

Identity. This species was described and diagnosed from Kirindy Forest, western Madagascar. Among Aglyptodactylus , this species can be unequivocally identified by its different external morphology alone ( Fig. 6 a‒c). It is morphologically distinguished from all other known species in the genus by its broad head, large inner metatarsal tubercle, comparatively poorly developed webbing on feet, and largely connected lateral metatarsalia ( Fig. 4 ).

Call. The advertisement call of the species has been described by Glaw et al. (1998) from recordings obtained in 1995 from Kirindy. Our analysis of calls recorded by J. Glos at the same locality in 2001 (Vences et al. 2006: CD1/Track1) generally confirmed the call characters previously reported. The call consists of a series of pulsed notes repeated at somewhat irregular intervals ( Fig. 7 ). Notes are composed of 7‒12 well-separated pulses emitted with increasing repetition rate from beginning towards the end of the note. Slight differences among recordings are apparent in distinctly longer inter-note intervals (170‒319 vs. 31‒133 ms) in the more recent recordings, and might be the result of differences in calling motivation and/or temperature (temperature not available for 2001 recordings). Furthermore, our analysis revealed an amplitude modulation within notes ( Figs. 3 , 7 ) that is unique among known calls in Aglyptodactylus , with amplitude increasing towards the middle of the note and decreasing again towards its end. This amplitude modulation is not evident from the former call description (Glaw et al. 1998), likely due to the processing/filtering of the poor-quality recording, as in the oscillogram figured in Glaw et al. (1998) the amplitude appears to be cut off at a certain level. For call parameters of the 2001 recording see Table 2.

Natural history. Glaw et al. (1998), Glos (2003) and Glos & Linsenmair (2004) provided life history notes, and the latter authors also described the tadpole. Randrianiaina et al. (2011) provided figures of A. laticeps tadpoles and their mouthparts.

Distribution. The species likely occurs at various localities of dry western Madagascar, but so far has only been reliably recorded from Kirindy and Tsingy de Bemaraha (Glaw et al. 1998; Glos 2003; Raselimanana 2008). Rakotondravony (2006a) listed the species from Antsahabe in the Loky-Manombato region in north Madagascar.

Figures

FIGURE 3. Comparative oscillograms of the calls of known species of Aglyptodactylus at the same time scale (2000 milliseconds section each).

FIGURE 4. Ventral view of feet of representative specimens of Aglyptodactylus (not to scale; see Table 3 for measurements). Arrows point at the large inner metatarsal tubercles of A. laticeps and A. securifer, and at the lateral metatarsalia of A. laticeps connected by tissue rather than separated by webbing. Asterisks mark mirrored images.

FIGURE 6. Photographs in life of Aglyptodactylus laticeps and A. securifer: A. laticeps from Kirindy (a – c), with (b) being a female, and (c) probably being a male. Frontodorsal and ventral views of male holotype of A. securifer (ZFMK 59975) from Kirindy (d, g); dorsal and ventral views of a male of A. securifer from Ankarana (e, h); dorsal and ventral views of a female of A. securifer from Ankarana (ZSM 762 / 2003) (f, i); A. securifer from Berara (j); A. securifer from Tsingy de Bemaraha (k – l), with (k) corresponding to ZSM 14 / 2006. Photographed individuals not unequivocally assignable to preserved voucher specimens unless otherwise mentioned.

FIGURE 7. Audiospectrogram (above) and oscillogram (below) of an advertisement call of Aglyptodactylus laticeps, recorded at Kirindy.