Research on longevity and associated age data of South American anurans: trends, gaps and recommendations

Abstract

Longevity is one of the most important characteristics in the life history of organisms. It is directly associated with growth, reproduction and age of sexual maturity. Despite this, little is known about longevity in South American anuran species, a region considered as a hotspot of world diversity. Thus, we carried out a literature review of publications on longevity of South American anurans that used the skeletochronology method to identify the main publication trends, as well as to point out the main information gaps and suggest future directions. We found clear biases when we analysed temporal, spatial and taxonomic patterns in publications on longevity: (i) studies are recent (mostly from 2015 onwards), (ii) bufonids and leptodactylids were the most studied groups, (iii) medium to large species are the most studied, (iv) species with wide geographic distribution, low risk of extinction, (v) the studies are concentrated in Brazil and Argentina, and (vi) most studies are in the Chaco biogeographical sub-region. We suggest that future work prioritizes little explored families and with high species diversity, small-bodied species, with restricted distribution, threatened with extinction, in order to expand the representation of different evolutionary lineages along the biogeographical units of South America.