Hyperolius nitidulus Peters, 1875

Common Names

Plain Reed Frog (Hyperolius viridiflavus pallidus: Jacobsen, 2009, Afr. Herp News, 47: 8).

Chalky Reed Frog (Channing and Rödel, 2019, Field Guide Frogs & Other Amph. Afr.: 170).

Peter's Reed Frog (Auliya, Wagner, and Böhme, 2012, Bonn Zool. Bull., 61: 259).

Distribution

West African savannas from Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, and southern Mali eastwards into Nigeria, Burkina Faso, northern Cameroon, and western Central African Republic; expected in southern Chad, southern Niger, southern Mauritania.  

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo

Likely/Controversially Present: Gambia, Liberia, Niger

Comment

Removed from the synonymy of Hyperolius marmoratus by Rödel, 2000, Herpetofauna W. Afr., 1: 199 (who provided an account). Formerly it had been placed in synonymy with Hyperolius viridiflavus by Schiøtz, 1971, Vidensk. Medd. Dansk Naturhist. Foren., 134: 49; with Hyperolius marmoratus (sensu lato) by Boulenger, 1882, Cat. Batr. Sal. Coll. Brit. Mus., Ed. 2: 121–122; with Hyperolius picturatus by Loveridge, 1955, Rev. Suisse Zool., 62: 130. Considered a subspecies of Hyperolius viridiflavus by Laurent, 1952 "1951", Ann. Soc. R. Zool. Belg., 82: 395; Laurent, 1961, Rev. Zool. Bot. Afr., 64: 92. Wieczorek, Drewes, and Channing, 2000, J. Biogeograph., 27: 1241, provided a cladogram of the Hyperolius viridiflavus complex, including this species, and provided a map. Padial and De la Riva, 2004, Rev. Esp. Herpetol., 18: 96, suggested that this species will be found in southern Mauritania. Schiøtz, 1963, Vidensk. Medd. Dansk Naturhist. Foren., 125: 75-77, provided records for Nigeria. See comment under Hyperolius spatzi. Rödel, Sandberger-Loua, Penner, Mané, and Hillers, 2010, Bonn Zool. Bull., 57: 177–188, clarified the delimitation of the species, its distinctiveness from Hyperolius spatzi, and its range, suggesting that records from northeastern Nigeria, the driest savannas of Cameroon, and Central African Republic are based on misidentifications. See account for Cameroon by Amiet, 2012, Rainettes Cameroun: 195-203. Jacobsen, 2009, Afr. Herp News, 47: 2–20, reported Hyperolius viridiflavus pallidus from east-north-central Central African Republic. Channing, Rödel, and Channing, 2012, Tadpoles of Africa: 217, reported on comparative tadpole morphology. See general discussion of the Hyperolius viridiflavus–parallelus–marginatus group by Schiøtz, 1999, Treefrogs Afr.: 206–228. Auliya, Wagner, and Böhme, 2012, Bonn Zool. Bull., 61: 255–281, reported the species from the Bijagós Archipelago, Guinea-Bissau.  Marques, Ceríaco, Blackburn, and Bauer, 2018, Proc. California Acad. Sci., Ser. 4, 65 (Suppl. II): 108, provided a map for Angola and noted the record is likely based on a misidentification. Channing and Rödel, 2019, Field Guide Frogs & Other Amph. Afr.: 170–171, provided a brief account, photograph, and range map. Portik, Bell, Blackburn, Bauer, Barratt, Branch, Burger, Channing, Colston, Conradie, Dehling, Drewes, Ernst, Greenbaum, Gvoždík, Harvey, Hillers, Hirschfeld, Jongsma, Kielgast, Kouete, Lawson, Leaché, Loader, Lötters, van der Meijden, Menegon, Müller, Nagy, Ofori-Boateng, Ohler, Papenfuss, Rößler, Sinsch, Rödel, Veith, Vindum, Zassi-Boulou, and McGuire, 2019, Syst. Biol., 68: 859–875, implied in a supplemental figure that this nominal species is a complex. Ayoro, Segniagbeto, Hema, Penner, Oueda, Dubois, Rödel, Kabré, and Ohler, 2020, Zoosystema, 42: 547–582, discussed records, identification, and habitat in Burkina Faso. Tillack, de Ruiter, and Rödel, 2021, Zoosyst. Evol., Berlin, 97: 429, briefly discussed the early literature and collector of the type. Channing, 2022, Zootaxa, 5134: 301–354, discussed the systematics, reidentified a number of GenBank sequences, restricted the range by excluding a number of populations, provided a range map, molecular tree, and a summary of the color patterns for all of the named taxa in the synonymy, and characterized the advertisement call. Ayoro, Nicolas, Segniagbeto, Hema, Ohler, and Kabré, 2023, Afr. J. Ecol., 61: 878-889, provided dots maps for West Africa and modeled the distribution under the affects of climate change. Segniagbeto, Ohler, Rödel, Luiselli, and Dubois, 2024, Zoosystema, 46: 648, provided a brief account for Togo, discussing habitat, distribution, conservation status, and identification.

External links:

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• For access to general information see Wikipedia
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• 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.