Anurans of a protected area from Mantiqueira Complex, Atlantic Forest of Minas Gerais state, Brazil

Abstract

The ecological domain of the Atlantic Forest holds a remarkable diversity of anurans with a great degree of endemism, most of which are distributed in high altitude areas, mostly represented by the mountains along the Mantiqueira Complex and Serra do Mar. Despite its biological importance, the region still shows a gap of sampling concerning the amphibians. Thus, we present the first systematic survey of the anuran fauna from Área de Proteção Ambiental Boqueirão da Mira (APABM), in the region of Zona da Mata, Minas Gerais state, Brazil. Two fieldwork expeditions were performed where fifteen sample points were inventoried through active night search and day audiovisual survey in breeding and foraging sites. The anuran fauna of the APABM presented 43 species distributed in 12 families, with the Hylidae family being the richest (17 species). Besides, four species had their distribution increased due to our findings (Hylodes perere, Physalaemus rupestris, Bokermannohyla ibitipoca and Ololygon cosenzai), all of them as endemic to the Mantiqueira Complex. This study revealed that the APABM has a great diversity of anuran species, more representative than adjacent regions such as the Parque Estadual Ibitipoca and close to the richness presented for the Parque Estadual Serra Negra da Mantiqueira. This work demonstrates the great importance of the APABM for conservation, highlighting it as an area of high diversity of the regional anuran species.

Uma visão comparativa de unidades de conservação de proteção integral no estado de Minas Gerais, Brasil: conflitos locais e alternativas econômicas

“…O PEI também vive uma dualidade, pois é uma das unidades de conservação mais visitadas do Brasil, além de ser a mais frequentada por turistas em Minas Gerais [30], cercada por zonas rurais transformadas em áreas de proteção permanente para garantir a sua conservação. Por outro lado, a população do entorno da unidade teve boa parte do uso direto de suas propriedades "restringido" para assegurar a proteção do meio ambiente, que se faz necessária devido à relevância dos fatores abióticos e bióticos que compõem esta região, de ecótono entre a Mata Atlântica e o Cerrado, muito rica em biodiversidade e com espécies endêmicas da flora e fauna [31] [32] [33] [34].…”

Anuran species composition and density estimates from an Atlantic Forest area within the APA Serra da Mantiqueira, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil

“…Recent surveys have provided lists of amphibian species, mostly preliminary, for some high montane Atlantic Forest areas (i.e., above 1,000 m) in southeast Brazil (Cruz et al 2009, Siqueira et al 2011a,b, Garey et al 2014, Folly et al 2016, Lima et al 2021). These habitats are known for their high rates of endemism of anurans, particularly in portions of the Serra do Mar (Siqueira et al 2011b, Carvalho-e-Silva et al 2020 and Serra da Mantiqueira regions (Neves et al 2018.…”

“…In recent years, lists of species of amphibians have been compiled or updated for several forested areas in the state of Rio de Janeiro (e.g., Almeida-Gomes et al 2014, Caram et al 2016, Carvalho-e-Silva et al 2020, Dorigo et al 2021, contributing considerably to the knowledge of its amphibian fauna. However, gaps of knowledge for areas at high altitudes still remain, not only for the state of Rio de Janeiro, but for the Atlantic Forest biome as a whole (Lima et al 2021).…”