Search tool	Example of search string in box	What that means to the database
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	Hyl*	Will find all uses of "Hyl . . ." anywhere in a record: e.g., Hylarana, Hyla, Hylidae, Hylinae, Hylaedactyla.
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	*Hyla	Will find all uses of ". . . hyla" anywhere in a record: e.g., Hyla, Hylidae, Plectrohyla, Ptychadena hylaea, Adenomera hylaedactyla
	Hyla	Will find all records that contain stand-alone uses of Hyla: e.g., Hyla, Hyla arenicolor
Strings of words without quotation marks	Lithobates pipiens	Interprets this as "Lithobates OR pipiens" so will find the union of all records that contain either "Lithobates" or "pipiens": e.g., Lithobates omiltemanus, Hylorana pipiens
Strings of word with quotation marks	"Lithobates pipiens"	Interprets this as "Lithobates AND pipiens" so will return all records that have the character string "Lithobates pipiens" anywhere within a record: e.g., all members of the Lithobates pipiens complex.
AND statement. Means that the results of the search must include both words held together by an AND	Lithobates AND pipiens	Same as "Lithobates pipiens"
OR statement. Means that the results of the search will all records that have either of the terms held together by an OR	Lithobates OR "Costa Rica"	Recovers all records that contain the word "Lithobates" or "Costa Rica": 402 records inasmuch as this will include all records for the entire amphibian fauna of Costa Rica
Combining Boolean operators within the Basic Search box (AND, OR, NOT, quotation marks)	Lithobates AND "Costa Rica" NOT forreri	Recovers only records that contain the word Lithobates AND "Costa Rica", but excludes any record that contains the word "forreri" in any part of the record: 9 records
Printable HELP file

Search tool	Example of search string in box	What that means to the database
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	Hyl*	Will find all uses of "Hyl . . ." anywhere in a record: e.g., Hylarana, Hyla, Hylidae, Hylinae, Hylaedactyla.
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	*Hyla	Will find all uses of ". . . hyla" anywhere in a record: e.g., Hyla, Hylidae, Plectrohyla, Ptychadena hylaea, Adenomera hylaedactyla
Single word	Hyla	Will find all records that contain stand-alone uses of Hyla: e.g., Hyla, Hyla arenicolor
Strings of words without quotation marks	Lithobates pipiens	Interprets this as "Lithobates OR pipiens" so will find the union of all records that contain either "Lithobates" or "pipiens": e.g., Lithobates omiltemanus, Hylorana pipiens
Strings of word with quotation marks	"Lithobates pipiens"	Interprets this as "Lithobates AND pipiens" so will return all records that have the character string "Lithobates pipiens" anywhere within a record: e.g., all members of the Lithobates pipiens complex.
AND statement. Means that the results of the search must include both words held together by an AND	Lithobates AND pipiens	Same as "Lithobates pipiens"
OR statement. Means that the results of the search will all records that have either of the terms held together by an OR	Lithobates OR "Costa Rica"	Recovers all records that contain the word "Lithobates" or "Costa Rica": 402 records inasmuch as this will include all records for the entire amphibian fauna of Costa Rica
Combining Boolean operators within the Basic Search box (AND, OR, NOT, quotation marks)	Lithobates AND "Costa Rica" NOT forreri	Recovers only records that contain the word Lithobates AND "Costa Rica", but excludes any record that contains the word "forreri" in any part of the record: 9 records
Printable HELP file

Mertensophryne taitana (Peters, 1878)

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Bufonidae > Genus: Mertensophryne > Species: Mertensophryne taitana

Bufo taitanus Peters, 1878, Monatsber. Preuss. Akad. Wiss. Berlin, 1878: 208. Syntypes: ZMB 9298, MCZ 22327 (on exchange from ZMB according to Barbour and Loveridge, 1946, Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 96: 84); Marx, 1958, Fieldiana, Zool., 36: 429, noted a lectotype in the ZMB but this appears to be in error. Type locality: "Taita", Kenya.

Bufo katanganus Loveridge, 1932, Occas. Pap. Boston Soc. Nat. Hist., 8: 46. Holotype: BMNH 1920.5.13.2, by original designation. Type locality: "Lofoi, Katanga [Province], Belgian Congo [Dem. Rep. Congo]". Synonymy by Grandison, 1972, Zool. Meded., Leiden, 47: 41; Tandy and Keith, 1972, in Blair (ed.), Evol. Genus Bufo: 156.

Bufo ushoranus Loveridge, 1932, Occas. Pap. Boston Soc. Nat. Hist., 8: 45. Holotype: MCZ 10330, by original designation. Type locality: "Ulugu, Ushora, Tanganyika Territory [Tanzania]". Synonymy by Grandison, 1972, Zool. Meded., Leiden, 47: 38-42.

Bufo taitanus taitanus — Barbour and Loveridge, 1946, Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 96: 84; Loveridge, 1953, Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 110: 339.

Mertensophryne ushoranus — Tihen, 1960, Copeia, 1960: 226. Based on specimens of Bufo schmidti, according to Poynton, 1991, Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 152: 459.

Bufo ushoranus — Tandy and Keith, 1972, in Blair (ed.), Evol. Genus Bufo: 157.

Mertensophryne taitana — 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: 365.

Common Names

Teita Toad (Bufo taitanus: Broadley, 1971, Puku, 6: 110).

Taita Toad (Bufo taitanus: Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 43; Channing, 2001, Amph. Cent. S. Afr.: 96).

Ushora Toad (Bufo ushoranus [no longer recognized]; Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 43).

Black-chested Dwarf Toad (Bufo taitanus: Ananjeva, Borkin, Darevsky, and Orlov, 1988, Dict. Amph. Rept. Five Languages: 41; Channing, 2001, Amph. Cent. S. Afr.: 96 [alternative name]).

Dwarf Toad (Bufo taitanus: Channing and Howell, 2006, Amph. E. Afr.: 93 [alternative name]).

Taita Dwarf Toad (Channing and Howell, 2006, Amph. E. Afr.: 93 [alternative name]).

Taita Forest Toad (Channing and Rödel, 2019, Field Guide Frogs & Other Amph. Afr.: 88).

Distribution

Wooded grassland of Tanzania, southern and northwestern Kenya, and southward to southeastern Dem. Rep. Congo, Malawi, northern Zambia, and into adjacent Mozambique, possibly into northern Zimbabwe.

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: Congo, Democratic Republic of the, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia

Comment

In the Bufo taitanus complex of Tandy and Keith, 1972, in Blair (ed.), Evol. Genus Bufo: 156. The earless Bufo ushoranus, synonymized by Grandison with Bufo taitanus was considered by Tandy and Keith, 1972, in Blair (ed.), Evol. Genus Bufo, to be a distinct species in the related Bufo ushoranus group, which they considered to be close to the Bufo taitanus complex. See Grandison, 1972, Zool. Meded., Leiden, 47: 38-42, for synonymy and discussion. Channing, 2001, Amph. Cent. S. Afr.: 96, and Channing and Howell, 2006, Amph. E. Afr.: 93-94, provided accounts. Malonza, Lötters, and Measey, 2010, J. E. Afr. Nat. Hist., 99: 55, commented on range, life history, and conservation status in the Taita Hills of Kenya. Mercurio, 2011, Amph. Malawi: 130-131, provided an account for Malawi. Measey, Malonza, and Muchai, 2009, Amph. Taita Hills: 32-34, provided a brief account and photo for the Taita Hills, Kenya. Channing, Rödel, and Channing, 2012, Tadpoles of Africa: 147–148, reported on comparative tadpole morphology. Harper, Measey, Patrick, Menegon, and Vonesh, 2010, Field Guide Amph. E. Arc Mts. Tanzania and Kenya: 124–125, provided a brief account and photograph. Spawls, Wasonga, and Drewes, 2019, Amph. Kenya: 13, provided a range map for Kenya, photograph, and brief characterization. Channing and Rödel, 2019, Field Guide Frogs & Other Amph. Afr.: 90–91, provided a brief account, photograph, and range map.

External links:

Please note: these links will take you to external websites not affiliated with the American Museum of Natural History. We are not responsible for their content.

For access to general information see Wikipedia
For additional sources of general information from other websites search Google
For access to relevant technical literature search Google Scholar
For images search CalPhoto Images and Google Images
To search the NIH genetic sequence database, see GenBank
For additional information see AmphibiaWeb report
For information on conservation status and distribution see the IUCN Redlist
For information on distribution, habitat, and conservation see the Map of Life
For related information on conservation and images as well as observations see iNaturalist
For access to available specimen data for this species, from over 350 scientific collections, go to Vertnet.