A new species of the genus Megophrys Gunther, 1864 (Amphibia: Anura: Megophryidae) from Mount Wuyi, China

Abstract

A new species of horned toad, Megophrys ombrophila sp. nov., is described based on specimens found from Guadun village from Mount Wuyi in northwestern Fujian Province, China. The species is distinguished from other described Megophrys by morphology, bioacoustics, and molecular data of the 12S and 16S mitochondrial loci. The species is characterized by its rotund stature, head length approximately equal to head width, canthus rostralis well developed, tympanum large and distinct, vomerine teeth absent, margin of tongue smooth, not notched from behind, heels of the feet not meeting when femurs are held at 90° to the axis of the body and tibias are depressed against the femur, toes weakly webbed at base, dorsal skin mostly smooth with scattered granules and ridges, usually the presence of two discontinuous dorsolateral ridges, supratympanic fold distinct and well-developed, and with females ranging from 32.8–35 mm snout-to-vent length, and males ranging from 27.4–34.5 mm SVL. In its type locality, the species is sympatric with M. boettgeri and M. kuatunensis; and phylogenetically, the most closely related described species is M. obesa from southwest Guangdong province. As more cryptic species are described within the subfamily Megophryinae, the more apparent becomes the need for fine-scale molecular and phenotypic assessment to capture the many forms of this hyper-diverse group.

Multiple data revealed two new species of the Asian horned toad Megophrys Kuhl & Van Hasselt, 1822 (Anura, Megophryidae) from the eastern corner of the Himalayas

“…S5) in Medog, and M. vegrandis has been just found at 1110 m in a southwestern locality away from the type localities of the first two relatives (Mahony et al 2013). This case fits the "micro-endemism" model (Liu et al 2018;Wang et al 2019) for separating closely related species. On the other hand, the more "phylogenetically distant" species are often sympatric in microhabitat, such as tadpoles of Megophrys cf.…”

“…nov. in the same stream, indicating the "sympatric but phylogenetically distant" model. These biogeographical patterns have often been found in Megophrys (Mahony et al 2018;Liu et al 2018;Wang et al 2019), indicating a complicated picture of biogeographical history of this taxonomically diverse toad group.…”

Description of six new species of the subgenus Panophrys within the genus Megophrys (Anura, Megophryidae) from southeastern China based on molecular and morphological data

“…The Asian horned toads ( Megophrys ) comprise 85 recognized species which were previously classified in the subfamily Megophryinae (Frost 2019). They are widespread in montane forest area in tropical and subtropical Asia, including southern mainland China, southern and eastern Himalayas, across Indochina to Malay, to the islands of the Sunda Shelf and the Philippines (Chen et al 2017; Deuti et al 2017; Mahony et al 2017; Mahony et al 2018; Li et al 2018; Liu et al 2018; Munir et al 2018; Messenger et al 2019; Tapley et al 2018; Frost 2019). As a consequence of both morphological similarity among species and the complex patterns of genetic divergence, the taxonomy of these toads always has been controversial.…”

Description of a new horned toad of Megophrys Kuhl & Van Hasselt, 1822 (Amphibia, Megophryidae) from Zhejiang Province, China

“…The congeners M. boettgeri, M. lishuiensis, M. ombrophila, and M. xianjuensis all occur in Wuyi Mountains, Fujian Province and/or Zhejiang Province, China, and probably have sympatric distribution with Megophrys baishanzuensis sp. nov. (Fei et al 2012;Wang et al 2017b;Messenger et al 2019;Wang et al 2020). The new species can be distinguished from these species by a series of morphological characters as follows.…”