Limnomedusa Fitzinger, 1843

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Alsodidae > Genus: Limnomedusa
1 species

Limnomedusa Fitzinger, 1843, Syst. Rept.: 31. Type species: Cystignathus macroglossus Duméril and Bibron, 1841, by original designation.

Litopleura Jiménez de la Espada, 1875, Vert. Viaje Pacif. Verif. 1862–1865: 82. Type species: Litopleura maritimum Jiménez de la Espada, 1875, by monotypy. Synonymy by Boulenger, 1882, Cat. Batr. Sal. Coll. Brit. Mus., Ed. 2: 250.

English Names

Rapids Frogs (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 82).

Distribution

Southern Brazil (Paraná to Rio Grande do Sul), Uruguay, northeastern Argentina and northern Paraguay.

Comment

Placed in the tribe Telmatobiini by Lavilla, 1988, Occas. Pap. Mus. Nat. Hist. Univ. Kansas, 124: 12, but the opinion of Laurent, 1986, in Grassé and Delsol (eds.), Traite de Zool., 14, of placement in Leptodactylinae was accepted by Lavilla and Cei, 2001, Monogr. Mus. Reg. Sci. Nat. Torino, 28: 87. See also Lynch, 1978, Occas. Pap. Mus. Nat. Hist. Univ. Kansas, 72: 39, for comment on subfamily placement. Reviewed by Barrio, 1971, Physis, Buenos Aires, 30: 667–672. Frost, Grant, Faivovich, Bain, Haas, Haddad, de Sá, Channing, Wilkinson, Donnellan, Raxworthy, Campbell, Blotto, Moler, Drewes, Nussbaum, Lynch, Green, and Wheeler, 2006, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 297: 210, placed Limnomedusa in Alsodinae. Pyron and Wiens, 2011, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 61: 543–583, confirmed this arrangment and considered Limnomedusa the sister taxon of remaining alsodids. Blotto, Nuñez, Úbeda, Wheeler, and Faivovich, 2013, Cladistics, 29: 113–131, reported on the molecular phylogenetics of Alsodidae, and did not recover Limnomedusa as being particularly near the EupsophusAlsodes clade, but rather closer to Cycloramphus (Cycloramphidae), although their analysis was not designed to test this proposition. Regardless, this result suggested that the inclusion of Limnomedusa within Alsodidae is provisional and deserves substantially more testing.  Sabbag, Lyra, Zamudio, Haddad, Feio, Leite, Gasparini, and Brasileiro, 2018, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 122: 142–156, reported on molecular phylogenetics suggested that Limnomedusa is the sister taxon of Odontophrynidae, but did not make the taxonomic change. 

Contained taxa (1 sp.):

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