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

Plectrohyla Brocchi, 1877

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Hylidae > Subfamily: Hylinae > Genus: Plectrohyla

21 species

Plectrohyla Brocchi, 1877, Bull. Soc. Philomath., Paris, Ser. 7, 1: 92. Type species: Plectrohyla guatemalensis Brocchi, 1877, by original designation.

Cauphias Brocchi, 1877, Bull. Soc. Philomath., Paris, Ser. 7, 1: 129. Replacement name for Plectrohyla Brocchi, 1877.

Common Names

Spikethumb Frogs (Liner, 1994, Herpetol. Circ., 23: 25; Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 62; Liner and Casas-Andreu, 2008, Herpetol. Circ., 38: 19).

Distribution

Northern Central American highlands from Chiapas, Mexico, eastward through Guatemala and northern El Salvador to central and northern Honduras; undetermined larvae and subadult from Cerro Saslaya, north-central Nicaragua.

Comment

For review of genus and phylogenetics see Duellman and Campbell, 1992, Misc. Publ. Mus. Zool. Univ. Michigan, 181: 1–31. Wilson, McCranie, and Cruz-Díaz, 1994, Proc. Biol. Soc. Washington, 107: 67–78, discussed the phylogeny of the genus as did Duellman, 2001, Hylid Frogs Middle Am., Ed. 2: 1045–1048. Keys to, accounts of, and discussions of phylogenetics of the species in Honduras provided by McCranie and Wilson, 2002, Amph. Honduras: 285–311.In the Hylini of Faivovich, Haddad, Garcia, Frost, Campbell, and Wheeler, 2005, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 294: 89. Wiens, Fetzner, Parkinson, and Reeder, 2005, Syst. Biol., 54: 25, considered Plectrohyla to be part of their enlarged Hyla. Chaves-Acuña, Boza-Oviedo, Zúniga, Vásquez-Almazán, Chaves, Bolaños, McCranie, and Faivovich, 2024, Am. Mus. Novit., 4016: 1–17, discussed the molecular phylogenetics of Plectrohyla, Exerodonta, Isthmohyla, and Sarcohyla, resulting in the transfer of Exerodonta catracha and Isthmohyla insolita into Plectrohyla.

Contained taxa (21 sp.):

Plectrohyla acanthodes Duellman and Campbell, 1992

Plectrohyla avia Stuart, 1952

Plectrohyla calvata McCranie, 2017

Plectrohyla catracha (Porras and Wilson, 1987)

Plectrohyla chrysopleura Wilson, McCranie, and Cruz-Díaz, 1994

Plectrohyla dasypus McCranie and Wilson, 1981

Plectrohyla exquisita McCranie and Wilson, 1998

Plectrohyla glandulosa (Boulenger, 1883)

Plectrohyla guatemalensis Brocchi, 1877

Plectrohyla hartwegi Duellman, 1968

Plectrohyla insolita (McCranie, Wilson, and Williams, 1993)

Plectrohyla ixil Stuart, 1942

Plectrohyla lacertosa Bumzahem and Smith, 1954

Plectrohyla matudai Hartweg, 1941

Plectrohyla pokomchi Duellman and Campbell, 1984

Plectrohyla psiloderma McCranie and Wilson, 1999

Plectrohyla pycnochila Rabb, 1959

Plectrohyla quecchi Stuart, 1942

Plectrohyla sagorum Hartweg, 1941

Plectrohyla tecunumani Duellman and Campbell, 1984

Plectrohyla teuchestes Duellman and Campbell, 1992

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