Nectophrynoides Noble, 1926

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Bufonidae > Genus: Nectophrynoides

Nectophrynoides Noble, 1926, Am. Mus. Novit., 212: 15. Type species: Nectophryne tornieri Roux, 1906, by original designation.

Tornierobates Miranda-Ribeiro, 1926, Arq. Mus. Nac., Rio de Janeiro, 27: 19. Type species: Pseudophryne vivipara Tornier, 1905, by monotypy. Synonymy by Noble, 1926, Am. Mus. Novit., 212: 15.

English Names

African Tree Toads (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 44).

African Viviparous Toads (CITES, USFWS).

African Live-bearing Toads (Ananjeva, Borkin, Darevsky, and Orlov, 1988, Dict. Amph. Rept. Five Languages: 43).

Distribution

Montane environments in Tanzania.

Comment

Grandison, 1978, Monit. Zool. Ital., N.S., Suppl., 11: 119-172, and Grandison, 1981, Monit. Zool. Ital., N.S., Suppl., 15: 187-215, discussed characters and relationships of this genus. Dubois, 1987 "1986", Alytes, 5: 7-95, partitioned the genus into Nectophrynoides, Altiphrynoides, Nimbaphrynoides, and Spinophrynoides on the basis of reproductive data and phylogenetic literature provided by Grandison, 1978, Monit. Zool. Ital., N.S., Suppl., 11: 119-172; Grandison, 1981, Monit. Zool. Ital., N.S., Suppl., 15: 187-215; Wake, 1980, Copeia, 1980: 193-209; Lamotte and Xavier, 1972, Bull. Soc. Zool. France, 97: 413-428; and Lamotte and Lescure, 1977, Terre et Vie, 31: 225-312. Clarke, 1988, Tropical Zool., 1: 169-177, discussed the relationships with the Nectophrynoides (in the sense of including Altiphrynoides and Nimbaphrynoides)—Didynamipus group. Graybeal and Cannatella, 1995, Herpetologica, 51: 122, noted that there is no unambiguous evidence in support of the monophyly of this taxon and that it might be paraphyletic with respect to Nimbaphrynoides. Frost, Grant, Faivovich, Bain, Haas, Haddad, de Sá, Channing, Wilkinson, Donnellan, Raxworthy, Campbell, Blotto, Moler, Drewes, Nussbaum, Lynch, Green, and Wheeler, 2006, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 297: 129, placed Nectophrynoides phylogenetically near to Didynamipus, among the exemplars that they studied. Channing, Menegon, Salvidio, and Akker, 2005, Afr. J. Herpetol., 54: 155, provided a key to species of Nectophrynoides and suggested that the distinctiveness of Altiphrynoides, Nimbaphrynoides, Nectophrynoides, and Spinophrynoides needed to be revisited with molecular data. Smith and Chiszar, 2006, Herpetol. Conserv. Biol., 1: 6-8, implied that this taxon should be considered a subgenus of Bufo; see comment under Bufonidae. Menegon, Doggart, and Owen, 2008, Acta Herpetol., Firenze, 3: 107-127, reported four undescribed species from the Nguru Mountains of eastern Tanzania. Van Bocxlaer, Biju, Loader, and Bossuyt, 2009, BMC Evol. Biol., 9 (e131): 1-10, and Van Bocxlaer, Loader, Roelants, Biju, Menegon, and Bossuyt, 2010, Science, 327: 679-682, considered this taxon to be the sister of Churamiti, but did not address Altiphrynoides or Nimbaphrynoides. Pyron and Wiens, 2011, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 61: 543-583, in their study of Genbank sequences, confirmed previous work.

Contained taxa

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