Follow-up ecological studies for cryptic species discoveries: Decrypting the leopard frogs of the eastern U.S.

ABSTRACT: Cryptic species are a challenge for systematics, but their elucidation also may leave critical information gaps about the distribution, conservation status, and behavior of affected species. We use the leopard frogs of the eastern U.S. as a case study of this issue. We refined the known range of the recently described Rana kauffeldi, the Atlantic Coast Leopard Frog, relative to the region's two other leopard frog species, conducted assessments of conservation status, and improved methods for separating the three species using morphological field characters. We conducted over 2,000 call and visual surveys and took photographs of and tissue samples from hundreds of frogs. Genetic analysis supported a three-species taxonomy and provided determinations for 220 individual photographed frogs. Ra

SUBMITTER: Schlesinger MD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6226167 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature