Phyllomedusa tarsius (Cope, 1868)

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Hylidae > Subfamily: Phyllomedusinae > Genus: Phyllomedusa > Species: Phyllomedusa tarsius

Pithecopus tarsius Cope, 1868, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Philadelphia, 20: 113. Type(s): Smithsonian Museum (USNM) 6652, by original designation; now lost, according to Duellman, 1977, Das Tierreich, 95: 164. Type locality: "Río Napo, or Upper Amazon, below the mouth of the former", Departamento Loreto, Peru.

Phyllomedusa tarsius — Boulenger, 1882, Cat. Batr. Sal. Coll. Brit. Mus., Ed. 2: 428.

Phyllomedusa nicefori Barbour, 1926, Occas. Pap. Boston Soc. Nat. Hist., 5: 191. Holotype: MCZ 11611, by original designation. Type locality: "Villavicencio, . . . . a town on the Rio Meta in the tropical lowlands east of Bogotá: altitude 452 meters. . . . ", Department of Meta, Colombia. Synonymy by Duellman, 1974, Herpetologica, 30: 108.

Phyllomedusa edentula Andersson, 1945, Ark. Zool., 37A(2): 84. Holotype: NHRM 1965, according to Duellman, 1977, Das Tierreich, 95: 164. Type locality: "Rio Pastaza"", Ecuador. Synonymy by Duellman, 1974, Herpetologica, 30: 108.

Phyllomedusa niceforoi — Funkhouser, 1957, Occas. Pap. Nat. Hist. Mus. Stanford Univ., 5: 47. Incorrect subsequent spelling.

Phyllomedusa orcesi Funkhouser, 1957, Occas. Pap. Nat. Hist. Mus. Stanford Univ., 5: 48. Holotype: CAS-SU 1036, by original designation. Type locality: "Chicherota (Chichirota), a settlement on the west bank of the Bobonaza River, Napo-Pastaza Province [now Provincia Pastaza], eastern Ecuador (Lat. 2° 22′ S., Long. 76° 38′ W.); altitude approximately 280 meters". Synonymy by Duellman, 1974, Herpetologica, 30: 108.

Pithecopus nicefori — Lutz, 1966, Copeia, 1966: 236.

Pithecopus tarsius — Lutz, 1966, Copeia, 1966: 236.

Common Names

Tarsus Leaf Frog (Coloma and Duellman, 2025, Amph. Ecuador. Vol. 4: xxxi). 

Rana de Hoja de de Tarso (Spanish: Coloma and Duellman, 2025, Amph. Ecuador. Vol. 4: xxxi).

Brownbelly Leaf Frog (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 62).

Distribution

Amazon Basin in southern Colombia, Ecuador, Peru (to, but not yet recorded in, Bolivia), and Brazil, with seemingly isolated populations in the Cordillera Occidental of Colombia and along the lowlands on the eastern side of the Merida Andes in western Venezuela and central Guyana (see comment).

Geographic Occurrence

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

Likely/Controversially Present: Bolivia

Comment

Closely related to Phyllomedusa trinitatis and Phyllomedusa venusta, according to Duellman, 1974, Herpetologica, 30: 105–112. Duellman, 1978, Misc. Publ. Mus. Nat. Hist. Univ. Kansas, 65: 177–179, provided a brief account including characterization of call and tadpole. Zimmerman, 1983, Herpetologica, 39: 235–246, and Zimmerman and Bogart, 1984, Acta Amazonica, 14: 473–520, reported on vocalization. In the Phyllomedusa tarsius group of Faivovich, Haddad, Garcia, Frost, Campbell, and Wheeler, 2005, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 294: 117–118 Rodríguez and Duellman, 1994, Univ. Kansas Mus. Nat. Hist. Spec. Publ., 22: 45–46, provided a brief account for the Iquitos region of northeastern Peru. Duellman, 1997, Sci. Pap. Nat. Hist. Mus. Univ. Kansas, 2: 20–21, commented on identifications of a population in southeastern Venezuela. In the Phyllomedusa tarsius group of Barrio-Amorós, 2006, Zootaxa, 1309: 55–68. La Marca, 1996, Herpetol. Rev., 27: 149, reported the species from the states of Barinas and Bolívar, Venezuela, and commented on the range. Forlani, Bernardo, and Zaher, 2012, Check List, 8: 155–157, provided a record for Guyana and a spot map. Barrio-Amorós, 2009, Mem. Fund. La Salle Cienc. Nat., 171: 19–46, discussed the biology and range in Venezuela and transferred all previous records Phyllomedusa tarsius from Barinas Province, Guianan Venezuela, to Phyllomedusa trinitatis, suggesting that the Guyana record of  Phyllomedusa tarsius by Forlani, Bernardo, and Zaher, 2012, Check List, 8: 155–157. might require reevaluation. Bernarde, Machado, and Turci, 2011, Biota Neotrop., 11: 117–144, reported specimens from Reserva Extrativista Riozinho da Liberdade, Acre, Brazil. Señaris Vasquez, Lampo, Rojas-Runjaic, and Barrio-Amorós, 2014, Guía Ilust. Anf. Parque Nac. Canaima: 176–177, provided a photograph and a brief account for the Parque Nacional de Canaima, Venezuela. Székely, Armijos-Ojeda, Ordóñez-Delgado, Székely, and Cogǎlniceanu, 2016, Check List, 12 (5: 1966): 1–5, provided a record for Zamora-Chinchipe, southern Ecuador on the Amazonian versant. See Barrio-Amorós, Rojas-Runjaic, and Señaris Vasquez, 2019, Amph. Rept. Conserv., 13 (1: e180): 107, for comments on range and literature, doubting the presence of Phyllomedusa tarsius, sensu stricto, in Venezuela, these populations suggested to be of an unnamed species. 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. For identification of larvae  in central Amazonia, Brazil, see Hero, 1990, Amazoniana, 11: 201–262. Schiesari, Rossa-Feres, Menin, and Hödl, 2022, Zootaxa, 5223: 105–106, detailed larval morphology and natural history. Gagliardi-Urrutia, García Dávila, Jaramillo-Martinez, Rojas-Padilla, Rios-Alva, Aguilar-Manihuari, Pérez-Peña, Castroviejo-Fisher, Simões, Estivals, Guillen Huaman, Castro Ruiz, Angulo Chávez, Mariac, Duponchelle, and Renno, 2022, Anf. Loreto: 176–177, provided a brief account, photograph, dot map, and genetic barcode for Loreto, Peru. Coloma and Duellman, 2025, Amph. Ecuador. Vol. 4: 31–34, provided an account, with photographs, which summarized identification, adult and larval morphology, systematics, natural history, distribution (including a dot map for Ecuador), conservation, and (on p. 37374) vocalizations.

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