Scaphiophryninae Laurent, 1946

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Microhylidae > Subfamily: Scaphiophryninae
12 species

Scaphiophryninae Laurent, 1946, Rev. Zool. Bot. Afr., 39: 337. Type genus: Scaphiophryne Boulenger, 1882.

Pseudohemisiinae Tamarunov, 1964, in Orlov (ed.), Osnovy Paleontologii, 12: 132. Type genus: Pseudohemisus Mocquard, 1895. Synonymy by Dubois, 1983, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 52: 274.

Scaphiophrynidae — Kuhn, 1967, Amph. Rept.: 37; Dubois, 1987 "1986", Alytes, 5: 34; Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 309; Bossuyt and Roelants, 2009, in Hedges and Kumar (eds.), Timetree of Life: 357.

Scaphiophryniinae — Guibé, 1978, Bonn. Zool. Monogr., 11: 8.

Scaphiophrynini — Dubois, Ohler, and Pyron, 2021, Megataxa, 5: 211. Tribe. Attributed to Laurent, 1946. 

Common Names

Rain Frogs (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 114).

Distribution

Madagascar.

Comment

Although considered a subfamily of Ranidae by several authors, Guibé, 1956, Bull. Mus. Natl. Hist. Nat. Paris, Ser. 2, 28: 180–182, suggested that Scaphiophryninae actually belonged with Microhylidae, an arrangement followed by Dubois, 1981, Monit. Zool. Ital., N.S., Suppl., 15: 225–284. Blommers-Schlösser, 1975, Beaufortia, 24: 7–26, noted that scaphiophrynine larvae show derived features of Microhylidae, and summarized the literature of the controversy. Wassersug, 1984, Herpetologica, 40: 138–148, provided more data on tadpole morphology which supported Blommers-Schlösser's position. Savage, 1973, in Vial (ed.), Evol. Biol. Anurans, included this subfamily in the Hyperoliidae with no discussion. Dubois, 1987 "1986", Alytes, 5: 34, and Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 305–352, elevated the rank of this taxon to that of a family, Scaphiophrynidae, with no discussion. Blommers-Schlösser and Blanc, 1991, Faune de Madagascar, 75: 21–37, reviewed the the biology and taxonomy of the group. Guibé, 1978, Bonn. Zool. Monogr., 11, provided synonymies. Ford and Cannatella, 1993, Herpetol. Monogr., 7: 94–117, noted that no evidence for the monophyly of this taxon exists. Haas, 2003, Cladistics, 19: 50, suggested that Paradoxophyla is more closely related to Phrynomerinae than to the remaining Scaphiophryninae, rendering the latter para- or polyphyletic. Frost, Grant, Faivovich, Bain, Haas, Haddad, de Sá, Channing, Wilkinson, Donnellan, Raxworthy, Campbell, Blotto, Moler, Drewes, Nussbaum, Lynch, Green, and Wheeler, 2006, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 297, suggested that Scaphiophryne is deeply imbedded within the microhylid tree and placed Paradoxophyla as incertae sedis at the level of Microhylidae pending resolution of the its phylogenetic position. van der Meijden, Vences, Hoegg, Boistel, Channing, and Meyer, 2007, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 44: 1017–1030, placed Paradoxophyla as the sister taxon of Scaphiophryne on the basis of DNA sequence data and implied its inclusion in Scaphiophryninae and also suggested that Scaphiophryninae and Cophylinae might be sister taxa. Grosjean, Glos, Teschke, Glaw, and Vences, 2007, Zool. J. Linn. Soc., 151: 555–576, confirmed the results of van der Meijden, Vences, Hoegg, Boistel, Channing, and Meyer, 2007, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 44: 1017–1030, and suggested that the seemingly plesiomorphic larval mouthparts of Scaphiophryne represent reversals. Bossuyt and Roelants, 2009, in Hedges and Kumar (eds.), Timetree of Life: 357–364, considered this taxon a distinct family based on its suggested Mesozoic origin. Pyron and Wiens, 2011, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 61: 543–583, suggested Scaphiophryninae to be the sister taxon of a group composed of Dyscophinae, Microhylinae, Kalophryninae, Melanobatrachinae, and Asterophryinae. They also provided a tree of their exemplars from this subfamily.

Contained taxa (12 sp.):

Paradoxophyla Blommers-Schlösser and Blanc, 1991 (2 sp.)
Scaphiophryne Boulenger, 1882 (10 sp.)

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