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

Xenopus muelleri (Peters, 1844)

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Pipidae > Subfamily: Dactylethrinae > Genus: Xenopus > Species: Xenopus muelleri

Dactylethra muelleri Peters, 1844, Monatsber. Preuss. Akad. Wiss. Berlin, 1844: 37. Syntypes: ZMB 3556 (3 tadpoles), 3557 (3 specimens), 6164 (2 specimens) according to Bauer, Günther, and Robeck, 1996, Mitt. Zool. Mus. Berlin, 72: 270, and MZUT An 262 (received from ZMB), according to Gavetti and Andreone, 1993, Cat. Mus. Reg. Sci. Nat., Torino, 10: 41. Type locality: "Mozambique"; given as “Cabaceira, Boror, Sena, Tette” by Peters, 1854, Ber. Bekannt. Verhandl. K. Preuss. Akad. Wiss. Berlin, 1854: xxx; restricted to "Tete, Zambezi River", Mozambique, by Loveridge, 1957, Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 117: 308.

Xenopus mülleri — Peters, 1875, Monatsber. Preuss. Akad. Wiss. Berlin, 1875: 201; Peters, 1882, Naturwiss. Reise Mossambique, Zool. 3: 180; Noble, 1924, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., 49: 157.

Xenopus muelleri — Boulenger, 1882, Cat. Batr. Sal. Coll. Brit. Mus., Ed. 2: 457.

Xenopus (Xenopus) muelleri — Kobel, Barandun, and Thiebaud, 1998, Herpetol. J., 8: 13.

Common Names

Yellow-bellied Platanna (Pienaar, 1963, Koedoe, 6: 78).

Northern Platanna (Wager, 1965, Frogs S. Afr.: 97; Passmore and Carruthers, 1979, S. Afr. Frogs: 44).

Tropical Platanna (Broadley, 1973, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 10: 22; Passmore and Carruthers, 1978, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 19: 3; Passmore and Carruthers, 1979, S. Afr. Frogs: 44).

Müller's Clawed Frog (Passmore and Carruthers, 1979, S. Afr. Frogs: 44; Lambiris, 1990 "1989", Monogr. Mus. Reg. Sci. Nat. Torino, 10: 44).

Müller's Platanna (Broadley, 1978, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 19: 33; Van Dijk, 1978, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 17: 14).

Müller's Clawed Frog (Van Dijk, 1978, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 17: 14; Channing and Howell, 2006, Amph. E. Afr.: 241).

Müller's Clawed Toad (Van Dijk, 1978, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 17: 14).

Sago-bellied Platanna (Van Dijk, 1978, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 17: 14).

Sago-bellied Clawed Frog (Van Dijk, 1978, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 17: 14).

Sago-bellied Clawed Toad (Van Dijk, 1978, J. Herpetol. Assoc. Afr., 17: 14).

Muller's Clawed Frog (Ananjeva, Borkin, Darevsky, and Orlov, 1988, Dict. Amph. Rept. Five Languages: 110; Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 97).

Muller's Smooth Clawed Frog (Ananjeva, Borkin, Darevsky, and Orlov, 1988, Dict. Amph. Rept. Five Languages: 110).

Savanna Clawed Frog (Ananjeva, Borkin, Darevsky, and Orlov, 1988, Dict. Amph. Rept. Five Languages: 110).

Distribution

Found along the East African coastal belt from extreme southern Kenya through Tanzania into northwestern border areas of Rep. South Africa, Botswana and Caprivi region of Namibia and adjacent southeastern Angola; a similar but unnamed species from Burkina Faso eastward across Sudan-Guinea zone to northeastern Dem. Rep. Congo; isolated record, presumably of the unnamed species, in the Ennedi (northeastern Chad) (see comment).

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: Angola, Botswana, Chad, Congo, Democratic Republic of the, Eswatini, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe

Comment

Chromosome number 2n = 36 (Tymowska and Kobel, 1972, Cytogenetics, 11: 271). A savanna species, like Xenopus laevis, but distinguished throughout extensive range by preference for hotter, more lowland regions (Tinsley, 1981, Monit. Zool. Ital., N.S., Suppl., 15: 135). Poynton and Broadley, 1985, Ann. Natal Mus., 26: 507–508, noted specimens that they regarded as intermediate between Xenopus muelleri and Xenopus laevis laevis, although they did not doubt the species status of the taxa. See account by Inger, 1968, Explor. Parc Natl. Garamba, Miss. H. de Saeger, 52: 18, and also brief accounts by Lambiris, 1988, Lammergeyer, 39: 43–44, Pickersgill, 2007, Frog Search: 55–56, and Du Preez and Carruthers, 2009, Compl. Guide Frogs S. Afr.: 334–335. Auerbach, 1987, Amph. Rept. Botswana: 32, provided a summary account and grid map for Botswana. Channing and Howell, 2006, Amph. E. Afr.: 241–243, provided an account as did Measey, 2004, in Minter et al. (eds.), Atlas Frogs S. Afr. Lesotho and Swaziland: 266–267. Mercurio, 2011, Amph. Malawi: 243–244, provided an account for Malawi. Channing, Rödel, and Channing, 2012, Tadpoles of Africa: 297, provided information on comparative larval morphology. Mechkarska, Ahmed, Coquet, Leprince, Jouenne, Vaudry, King, and Conlon, 2011, Peptides, 32: 1502–1508, suggested on the basis of skin peptide analysis that the western population of nominal Xenopus muelleri is an unnamed species distinct from Xenopus muelleri and closer to Xenopus borealis. Harper, Measey, Patrick, Menegon, and Vonesh, 2010, Field Guide Amph. E. Arc Mts. Tanzania and Kenya: 254–255, provided a brief account and photograph. Du Preez and Carruthers, 2017, Frogs S. Afr., Compl. Guide: 356–357, provided an account, including a polygon range map for southern Africa, photograph, identification features, adult and larval morphology, habitat, and call. Ohler and Frétey, 2014, J. E. Afr. Nat. Hist., 103: 93, provided a brief discussion of a collection from northern Mozambique. In the Xenopus muelleri group of Evans, Carter, Greenbaum, Gvoždík, Kelley, McLaughlin, Pauwels, Portik, Stanley, Tinsley, Tobias, and Blackburn, 2015, PLoS One, 10(12): e0142823: 29. Marques, Ceríaco, Blackburn, and Bauer, 2018, Proc. California Acad. Sci., Ser. 4, 65 (Suppl. II): 61–62, provided a map for Angola and discussed the literature. Phaka, Netherlands, Kruger, and Du Preez, 2017, Bilingual Field Guide Frogs Zululand: 61, provided a photograph, Zululand regional map, and a brief account of life history and identification. Channing and Rödel, 2019, Field Guide Frogs & Other Amph. Afr.: 50–51, provided a brief account, photograph, and range map. Dehling and Sinsch, 2023, Diversity, 15 (512): 1–81, discussed the range, identification, natural history, advertisement call, and conservation status in Rwanda.

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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