Dendropsophus parviceps (Boulenger, 1882)

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Hylidae > Genus: Dendropsophus > Species: Dendropsophus parviceps

Hyla parviceps Boulenger, 1882, Cat. Batr. Sal. Coll. Brit. Mus., Ed. 2: 393. Holotype: BMNH 1947.2.13.51 (formerly 1880.12.5.214) according to Condit, 1964, J. Ohio Herpetol. Soc., 4: 93, this animal figured in the original publication on pl. 225, fig. 3. Type locality: "Sarayacu", Provincia Pastaza, Ecuador.

Dendropsophus parviceps — Faivovich, Haddad, Garcia, Frost, Campbell, and Wheeler, 2005, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 294: 93.

Common Names

Small-headed Swampfrog (Coloma and Duellman, 2025, Amph. Ecuador. Vol. 2: xxxiii). 

Ranita de Charco de Cabeza Pequeña (Spanish: Coloma and Duellman, 2025, Amph. Ecuador. Vol. 2: xxxiii).

Sarayacu Treefrog (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 57).

Orange-shanked Treefrog (Villacampa-Ortega, Serrano-Rojas, and Whitworth, 2017, Amph. Manu Learning Cent.: 142).  

Distribution

Amazon Basin in western Brazil, Venezuela (Guaiquinima-tepui, Bolívar, and Caño Surumoni, Amazonas), Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and northern Bolivia. See comment. 

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Venezuela

Comment

See Duellman and Crump, 1974, Occas. Pap. Mus. Nat. Hist. Univ. Kansas, 23: 1-40, for comparative adult and larval morphology and advertisement call. Duellman, 1978, Misc. Publ. Mus. Nat. Hist. Univ. Kansas, 65: 156–158, provided a brief account including characterization of call and tadpole. See Schlüter and Mägdefrau, 1991, Amphibia-Reptilia, 12: 217-219, for Venezuelan record. Barrio-Amorós, 1999 "1998", Acta Biol. Venezuelica, 18: 33, commented on the range in Venezuela. Duellman, 2005, Cusco Amazonico: 220–222, provided an account (adult and larval morphology, description of the call, life history). In the Dendropsophus parviceps group of Faivovich, Haddad, Garcia, Frost, Campbell, and Wheeler, 2005, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 294: 93. Santiago Ron (personal commun., 17 Jan 2014) reports Ecuadorian specimens in the QCAZ. Bernarde, Machado, and Turci, 2011, Biota Neotrop., 11: 117–144, reported specimens from Reserva Extrativista Riozinho da Liberdade, Acre, Brazil. Lynch and Suárez-Mayorga, 2011, Caldasia, 33: 235–270, illustrated the tadpole and included the species in a key to the tadpoles of Amazonian Colombia. Moraes, Almeida, Fraga, Rojas-Zamora, Pirani, Silva, Carvalho, Gordo, and Werneck, 2017, ZooKeys, 715: 103–159, reported on specimens from the Serra da Mocidade, state of Roraima, northern Brazil.  This species was redelimited by the exclusion of Dendropsophus kubrincki and Dendropsophus kamagarini by Rivadeneira, Venegas, and Ron, 2018, ZooKeys, 726: 25–77, who revised the Dendropsophus parviceps complex and reviewed this species but did not address the Venezuelan records. See Barrio-Amorós, Rojas-Runjaic, and Señaris Vasquez, 2019, Amph. Rept. Conserv., 13 (1: e180): 76–77, for comments on range, systematics, and literature. For identification of larvae (as Hyla parviceps) in central Amazonia, Brazil, see Hero, 1990, Amazoniana, 11: 201–262. Señaris Vasquez and Rojas-Runjaic, 2020, in Rull and Carnaval (eds.), Neotrop. Divers. Patterns Process.: 571–632, commented on range and conservation status in the Venezuelan Guayana. Márquez, De la Riva, and Bosch, 1993, Biotropica, 25: 426–443, described the advertisement call. See brief account for the Manu region, Peru, by Villacampa-Ortega, Serrano-Rojas, and Whitworth, 2017, Amph. Manu Learning Cent.: 142–143. Metcalf, Marsh, Torres Pacaya, Graham, and Gunnels, 2020, Herpetol. Notes, 13: 753–767, reported the species from the Santa Cruz Forest Reserve, Loreto, northeastern Peru. In the Dendropsophus parviceps group of Orrico, Grant, Faivovich, Rivera-Correa, Rada, Lyra, Cassini, Valdujo, Schargel, Machado, Wheeler, Barrio-Amorós, Loebmann, Moravec, Zina, Solé, Sturaro, Peloso, Suárez, and Haddad, 2021, Cladistics, 37: 73–105. Schiesari, Rossa-Feres, Menin, and Hödl, 2022, Zootaxa, 5223: 56–57, detailed larval morphology and natural history. Ocampo, Aparicio, Bernal Hoverud, Domic, and Wallace, 2024, Herpetol. Notes, 17: 371–389, reported the species and its habitat in Madidi National Park, La Paz, Bolivia. In the Dendropsophus parviceps group of Whitcher, Orrico, Ron, Lyra, Cassini, Ferreira, Nakamura, Peloso, Rada, Rivera-Correa, Sturaro, Valdujo, Haddad, Grant, Faivovich, Lemmon, and Lemmon, 2025, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 204 (108275): 1–18. Coloma and Duellman, 2025, Amph. Ecuador. Vol. 2: 384–386, provided an account, with photographs, which summarized identification, adult morphology, systematics, natural history, distribution (including a dot map for Ecuador), conservation, and (on p. 579) the advertisement calls of two populations. Garcia-Romero, Martin-Solano, Araujo-Erazo, Hernández Hernández, Paredes, Prado-Aguas, and Carrillo-Bilbao, 2026, Biology, 15(451): 1–18, discussed distribution in Pastaza Province, Ecuador, and its conservation status. 

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