Hoplobatrachus crassus (Jerdon, 1853)

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Dicroglossidae > Subfamily: Dicroglossinae > Genus: Hoplobatrachus > Species: Hoplobatrachus crassus

Rana malabarica Kelaart, 1853, Prodr. Faunae Zeylan., 1: 191. Types: Not stated or known to exist. Type locality: "Trincomalie in paddy field and other marshy grounds", Sri Lanka. Considered a synonym of Rana tigerina (sensu lato) by Boulenger, 1890, Fauna Brit. India, Rept. Batr.: 449, and Bourret, 1942, Batr. Indochine: 240, although the type locality is extralimital to the known range. A junior primary homonym of Rana malabarica Tschudi.

Rana crassa Jerdon, 1853, J. Asiat. Soc. Bengal, 22: 531. Type(s): ZSIC; reported as lost by Jerdon, 1870, Proc. Asiat. Soc. Bengal, 1870: 67; lost, according to Dutta and Manamendra-Arachchi, 1996, Amph. Fauna Sri Lanka: 96. Type locality: "found in a few tanks in the Carnatic [now part Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, India]".

Hoplobatrachus ceylanicus Peters, 1863, Monatsber. Preuss. Akad. Wiss. Berlin, 1863: 445-470. Holotype: ZMB 3354 according to Bauer, 1998, Hamadryad, 23: 143. Type locality: "Trinkemalie, Ceylon" (=Trincomalee, Sri Lanka). Synonymy (with Rana tigrina) by Boulenger, 1882, Cat. Batr. Sal. Coll. Brit. Mus., Ed. 2: 26; Boettger, 1892, Ber. Offenbach. Ver. Naturkd., 1892: 94.

Rana (Hoplobatrachus) ceylanicusGünther, 1872, Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., Ser. 4, 9: 85.

Rana tigrina var. ceylanicaBoettger, 1892, Ber. Offenbach. Ver. Naturkd., 1892: 94.

Rana tigrina var. crassaBoulenger, 1918, Rec. Indian Mus., 15: 51-58.

Rana crassaAnnandale, 1918, Rec. Indian Mus., 15: 61; Bhaduri, 1944, J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc., 44: 481–483.

Rana tigrina crassaBourret, 1942, Batr. Indochine: 241.

Rana (Dicroglossus) crassaDubois, 1974, Bull. Mus. Natl. Hist. Nat. Paris, Ser. 3, Zool., 213: 378–380.

Limnonectes (Hoplobatrachus) crassusDubois, 1987 "1986", Alytes, 5: 60.

Hoplobatrachus crassusDubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 315.

English Names

Turkey Frog (Rana malabarica [no longer recognized]: Jerdon, 1853, J. Asiat. Soc. Bengal, 22: 531).

Malabar Bull Frog (Rana malabaricaKelaart, 1853, Prodr. Faunae Zeylan., 1: 191).

Carnatic Peters Frog (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 99).

Jerdon’s Bull Frog (Ananjeva, Borkin, Darevsky, and Orlov, 1988, Dict. Amph. Rept. Five Languages: 121; Das and Dutta, 1998, Hamadryad, 23: 64; Schleich, Anders, and Kästle, 2002, in Schleich and Kästle (eds.), Amph. Rept. Nepal: 79; Ahmed, Das, and Dutta, 2009, Amph. Rept. NE India: 37; Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Gururaja, and Bhatta, 2009, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, Occas. Pap., 302: 24; Mathew and Sen, 2010, Pict. Guide Amph. NE India: 35; de Silva, 2009, Amph. Rep. Sri Lanka Photograph. Guide: 72; Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Deepak, and Kulkarni, 2023, Fauna India Checklist, vers. 5.0 : 3).  

Jerdon’s Bullfrog (Schleich, Anders, and Kästle, 2002, in Schleich and Kästle (eds.), Amph. Rept. Nepal: 79; Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 185).

South Indian Bullfrog (Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 185).

Distribution

Sri Lanka and southern India north and east to Nepal (below 400 m elevation), Assam, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland, and Bangladesh, and possibly into adjacent western Myanmar (Rakhine State). 

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka

Likely/Controversially Present: Myanmar

Comment

In the Hoplobatrachus tigerinus group of Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 315 (following Dubois, 1987 "1986", Alytes, 5: 60). Discussed by Kirtisinghe, 1957, Amph. Ceylon: 32–35 (as Rana tigrina crassa), Dubois, 1974, Bull. Mus. Natl. Hist. Nat. Paris, Ser. 3, Zool., 213: 341–411, and Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 315. Removed from the synonymy of Rana tigerina by Dubois, 1974, Bull. Mus. Natl. Hist. Nat. Paris, Ser. 3, Zool., 213: 341–411. See account by Dutta and Manamendra-Arachchi, 1996, Amph. Fauna Sri Lanka: 96–99. Choudhury, Hussain, Buruah, Saikia, and Sengupta, 2002, Hamadryad, 26: 278, commented on the range in Assam, India. Chanda, 2002, Handb. Indian Amph.: 97, provided a brief account (as Rana crassa). Ray, 1999, Mem. Zool. Surv. India, 18: 29–33, also provided an account. Anders, 2002, in Schleich and Kästle (eds.), Amph. Rept. Nepal: 229–233, provided an account for the Nepal population. See brief account by Shrestha, 2001, Herpetol. Nepal: 79–81. Sarkar, Biswas, and Ray, 1992, State Fauna Ser., 3: 86–87, provided a brief account for West Bengal, India. Dutta, 1997, Amph. India Sri Lanka: 118–119, provided range in India, comments on misidentifications in the literature, and a partial bibliography. Ao, Bordoloi, and Ohler, 2003, Zoos' Print J., 18: 1117–1125, provided a specific locality for Nagaland, northeastern India. Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 185–187, provided an account for peninsular India. Ahmed, Das, and Dutta, 2009, Amph. Rept. NE India: 37, provided a brief account for northeastern India. Mathew and Sen, 2010, Pict. Guide Amph. NE India: 35, provided a brief characterization and photographs. Bopage, Wewelwala, Krvavac, Jovanovic, Safarek, and Pushpamal, 2011, Salamandra, 47: 173–177, reported the species in lowland forest in the Kanneliya Forest of southwestern Sri Lanka. See Shah and Tiwari, 2004, Herpetofauna Nepal: 54, for brief account for Nepal. Sarker, Howlader, and Kabir, 2012, Herpetol. Rev., 43: 298, provided a range extension to Nilphamari District, Bangladesh, and commented on the range. Al-Razi, Baki, and Alam, 2014, Herpetol. Rev., 45: 653–654, provided a range extension to Rangpur District, Bangladesh, and documented the known collection sites in that country. Sivaprasad, 2013, Common Amph. Kerala: 52–53, provided a brief account, photograph, and dot map for Kerala. Ahmad and Alam, 2015, Herpetol. Rev., 46: 560, provided a record from Nazipur, Naogaon District, Rajshahi Division, Bangladesh. Reported from extreme southwestern Nepal in the Shuklaphanta National Park by Rawat, Bhattarai, Poudyal, and Subedi, 2020, J. Threatened Taxa, 12: 11587. Prasad, Gautam, Gupta, Murthy, Ramesh, Shinde, and Das, 2020, Zootaxa, 4851: 450–476, reported on morphology for a population in the Panna Tiger Reserve, Madhya Pradesh, central India. Khatiwada, Wang, Zhao, Xie, and Jiang, 2021, Asian Herpetol. Res., 12: 1–35, discussed the species in Nepal. Zug, 2022, Smithson. Contrib. Zool., 653: 19, briefly discussed identification, habitat, and possible range within Myanmar. Srinivasulu and Kumar, 2022, J. Threatened Taxa, 14: 21268, reported the species from the state of Telangana, south-central India. Rabbe, Jaman, Alam, Rahman, and Sarker, 2022, Amph. Rept. Conserv., 16: 226–234, provided records for northwestern Bangladesh. 

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