Minervarya syhadrensis (Annandale, 1919)

English Names

Long-legged Cricket Frog (Khan, 1979, Biologia, Lahore, 25: 46).

Bombay Wart Frog (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 100).

Syhadra Frog (Das and Dutta, 1998, Hamadryad, 23: 65; Schleich, Anders, and Kästle, 2002, in Schleich and Kästle (eds.), Amph. Rept. Nepal: 79; Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 210; Mathew and Sen, 2010, Pict. Guide Amph. NE India: 33).

Syhadry Frog (Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Gururaja, and Bhatta, 2009, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, Occas. Pap., 302: 23).

Small Cricket Frog (Chanda, 2002, Handb. Indian Amph.: 135).

Southern Cricket Frog (Khan, 2002, Bull. Chicago Herpetol. Soc., 37: 160).

Hill Cricket Frog (Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 210).

Common Paddy-field Frog (de Silva, 2009, Amph. Rep. Sri Lanka Photograph. Guide: 71 [as Fejervarya limnocharis]).

Wrinkled Fejervarya (Minervarya caperata, no longer recognized: Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Gururaja, and Bhatta, 2009, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, Occas. Pap., 302: 16).

Shimoga Night Frog (Minervarya modesta [no longer recognized]: Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 102).

Distribution

Eastern and western India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal at low to moderate elevations (see comment).

Comment

Dubois, 1974, Bull. Mus. Natl. Hist. Nat. Paris, Ser. 3, Zool., 213: 383–384, removed this species from the synonymy of Rana limnocharis. Kuramoto and Joshy, 2001, Curr. Herpetol., Kyoto, 20: 88–89, reported calls from populations in southern India differ strongly from those reported from Nepal, suggesting that more than one species is covered by this name. Chanda, 2002, Handb. Indian Amph.: 135, provided a brief account (as Rana syhadrensis). Pakistan record provided by Khan, 2002, Bull. Chicago Herpetol. Soc., 37: 160), although this identification is now disputed. Anders, 2002, in Schleich and Kästle (eds.), Amph. Rept. Nepal: 249–253, provided an account for the Nepal population. Dutta, 1997, Amph. India Sri Lanka: 138–139, provided range, taxonomic comments, and partial taxonomic bibliography. Khan, 2006, Amph. Rept. Pakistan: 60, provided an account for Pakistan, although these specimens are now identifed as Minervarya pierrei. Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 210–211, provided an account. Ningombam and Bordoloi, 2007, Zoos' Print J., 22: 2688–2690, provided a record for Manipur, northeastern India. Das and Dutta, 2007, Hamadryad, 31: 154–181, noted two larval descriptions of varying levels of completeness in the literature. Borthakur, Kalita, Hussain, and Sengupta, 2007, Zoos' Print J., 22: 2639–2643, compared the species of Assam, northwest India (Fejervarya nepalensis, Fejervarya pierrei, Fejervarya syhadrensis, and Fejervarya teraiensis). Mathew and Sen, 2010, Pict. Guide Amph. NE India: 33, provided a brief characterization and photographs. Kotaki, Kurabayashi, Matsui, Kuramoto, Tjong, and Sumida, 2010, Zool. Sci., Tokyo, 27: 386–395, suggested on the basis of molecular evidence that Fejervarya syhadrensis is composed of at least two species, with one species in the Western Ghats (possibly conspecific with the population at the type locality) and another in Sri Lanka not conspecific (and unnamed), and either unlikely to be conspecific with the population at the type locality. The Sri Lankan population was judged to be most closely related to Fejervarya granosa and Fejervarya pierrei. Rasel, Hannan, and Howlader, 2007, Bangladesh Wildl. Bull., 2007: 1–3, reported the species in the Chittagong region of eastern Bangladesh. de Silva, 2009, Amph. Rep. Sri Lanka Photograph. Guide: 71, provided a brief account (as Fejervarya limnocharis) and color photograph. See Shah and Tiwari, 2004, Herpetofauna Nepal: 58, for brief account (as Limnonectes syhadrensis). Hasan, Islam, Khan, Alam, Kurabayashi, Igawa, Kuramoto, and Sumida, 2012, Zool. Sci., Tokyo, 29: 162–172, discussed ambiguities in identification of populations in Bangladesh, as Fejervarya syhadrensis. Masroor, 2012, Contr. Herpetol. N. Pakistan: 46–49, provided an account for northern Pakistan of a species he referred to "Fejervarya limnocharis" that he distinguished from Fejervarya syhadrensis; presumably this represents and unnamed species (DRF).  Subramanian, Dinesh, and Radhakrishnan, 2013, Atlas of Endemic Amph. W. Ghats: 45, provided a very brief characterization (as Fejervarya caperata), photograph, and dot map. Prasad, Gautam, Gupta, Murthy, Ramesh, Shinde, and Das, 2020, Zootaxa, 4851: 450–476, reported on morphology and advertisement call for a population (as Fejervarya caperata) in the Panna Tiger Reserve, Madhya Pradesh, central India. Köhler, Mogk, Khaing, and Than, 2019, Vert. Zool., Senckenberg, 69: 190, suggested that the distinctiveness from Minervarya pierrei and Minervarya granosa needs to be confirmed. O'Connell, Aryal, Sherchan, Dhakal, Chaudhary, and Karmacharya, 2019, J. Nat. Hist., London, 53: 1421–1437, reported on the Kathmandu Valley population, Nepal. Deuti, Sethy, and Ray, 2014, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, 114: 130–131, provided a  brief account for the population of the Eastern Ghats region, India. Sreekumar and Dinesh, 2020, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, 120: 33–40, discussed the range in Maharashtra, India, in terms of agro-climatic zones. Chandramouli, Ankaiah, Arul, Dutta, and Ganesh, 2019, Asian J. Conserv. Biol., 8: 84–87, questioned the taxonomic status of this species separate from Minervarya syhadrensis but took no taxonomic action. Gautam, Chalise, Thapa, and Bhattarai, 2020, IRCF Rept. & Amph., 27: 18–28, briefly discussed abundance and elevational range in the Ghandruk region of central Nepal. Phuge, Patil, Pandit, Kulkarni, Chennakeshavamurthy, Deepak, and Dinesh, 2020, Zootaxa, 4869: 451–492, discussed systematic and identification problems of nominal Minervarya syhadrensis in the Western Ghats of southern India. Khatiwada, Wang, Zhao, Xie, and Jiang, 2021, Asian Herpetol. Res., 12: 1–35, discussed the species in Nepal. Gayen, Dey, and Roy, 2021, Zoos' Print J., 36: 33–39, reported a record from Durgapur Subdivision, West Bengal, India. Rais, Ahmed, Sajjad, Akram, Saeed, Hamid, and Abid, 2021, ZooKeys, 1062: 157–175, excluded this species from the Pakistan fauna without comment, implying that the earlier records of this species from that country were in error;  this and the discussion provided by Akram, Rais, López-Hervas, Tarvin, Saeed, Bolnick, and Cannatella, 2021, Ecol. Evol., 11: 14188, suggests that the Pakistan records of nominal Minervarya syhadrensis are referrable to Minervarya pierrei (DRF). 

modesta: The species was recognized by Dubois, 1987 "1986", Alytes, 5: 68, but this recognition as something other than a synonym of Nyctibatrachus sanctipalustris was rejected by Chanda and Das, 1997, Hamadryad, 22: 48-49. Biju, Van Bocxlaer, Mahony, Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Zachariah, Giri, and Bossuyt, 2011, Zootaxa, 3029: 1-96, transferred the species of Fejervarya. Given that Howlader, 2011, Bangladesh Wildl. Bull., 5: 1–7, did not include this species in his list of Zakerana, does not preclude this taxon being placed in that taxon inasmuch as Howlader would not have seen the paper of  Biju, Van Bocxlaer, Mahony, Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Zachariah, Giri, and Bossuyt, 2011, Zootaxa, 3029: 67-68, prior to the submission of his own paper on Zakerana. However, the type of modesta was reported by Biju et al., 2011, to have limbs destroyed, which would make it difficult to assign the nominal species to either Fejervarya or Zakerana withouth recourse to geography. Regardless, as of this date (17 Feb. 2015) no one has presented evidence which would place modesta in Zakerana and I hesitate to make the change (DRF).

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