Aromobates Myers, Paolillo-O., and Daly, 1991

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Superfamily: Dendrobatoidea > Family: Aromobatidae > Subfamily: Aromobatinae > Genus: Aromobates
18 species

Aromobates Myers, Paolillo-O., and Daly, 1991, Am. Mus. Novit., 3002: 4. Type species: Aromobates nocturnus Myers, 1991, by original designation.

Nephelobates La Marca, 1994, Inst. Geograf. Fac. Cienc. Forestal., Univ. Los Andes, An. Invest., 1991: 40. Type species: Phyllobates alboguttatus Boulenger, 1903, by original designation. Synonymy by Grant, Frost, Caldwell, Gagliardo, Haddad, Kok, Means, Noonan, Schargel, and Wheeler, 2006, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 299: 160.

English Names

Skunk Frogs (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 48).

Distribution

Mérida Andes of Venezuela and adjacent Cordillera Oriental of Colombia.

Comment

Aromobates was conjectured in the original publication to be restricted solely to Aromobates nocturus and the sister-taxon of remaining dendrobatids (now Dendrobatoidea), although similar to the geographically proximate Nephelobates. Grant, Humphrey, and Myers, 1997, Am. Mus. Novit., 3212: 29, suggested a possible relationship of Nephelobates with Aromobates. Grant, Frost, Caldwell, Gagliardo, Haddad, Kok, Means, Noonan, Schargel, and Wheeler, 2006, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 299: 1-268, redelimited Aromobates to include Nephelobates and provided a well-corrobated phylogeny of the group. Nephelobates was the former Colostethus alboguttatus group of Rivero, 1990 "1988", Mem. Soc. Cienc. Nat. La Salle, 48: 3-32. See comment by Savage, 2002, Amph. Rept. Costa Rica: 377, regarding the generic arrangements of (former) Aromobates, Colostethus, Mannophryne, and Nephelobates. Vences, Kosuch, Boistel, Haddad, La Marca, and Lötters, 2003, Organisms Divers. Evol., 3: 219, also discussed phylogeny within Nephelobates. Barrio-Amorós, Rivero, and Santos, 2011, Zootaxa, 3063: 39-52, suggested that Aromobates is difficult to differentiate from Allobates except by molecular markers; they also confirmed the synonymy of Nephelobates with Aromobates. Barrio-Amorós and Santos, 2012, Zootaxa, 3422: 1-31, reported on the molecular phylogenetics and systematics of the group. Grant, Rada, Anganoy-Criollo, Batista, Dias, Jeckel, Machado, and Rueda-Almonacid, 2017, S. Am. J. Herpetol., 12 (Special Issue): 1–90, reviewed the systematics of Aromobates as well as previous literature and opinions. 

Contained taxa (18 sp.):

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