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

Tomopterna kachowskii (Nikolskii, 1900)

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Pyxicephalidae > Subfamily: Cacosterninae > Genus: Tomopterna > Species: Tomopterna kachowskii

Chiromantis kachowskii Nikolskii, 1900, Annu. Mus. Zool. Acad. Imp. Sci. St. Petersbourg, 5: 246. Syntypes: ZISP 2077.1-2, by original designation. Type locality: "Ferad in Abyssinia". Rendered as Ferad, Ethiopia, at approximately 10 49 N, 42 42 E) by Largen and Borkin, 2000, Bull. Zool. Nomencl., 57: 32, who also made the synonymy with Rana cryptotis.

Rana (Tomopterna) hieroglyphica Ahl, 1927 "1925", Sitzungsber. Ges. Naturforsch. Freunde Berlin, 1925: 42. Holotype: ZMB, unnumbered in original publication. Type locality: "So-Omadu", Ethiopia. Synonymy with Rana delalandii by Parker, 1932, Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 1932: 34. Synonymy with Tomopterna cryptotis by Lanza, 1981, Monit. Zool. Ital., N.S., Suppl., 15: 168; synonymy with Tomopterna kachowskii by Zimkus and Larson, 2011, Zootaxa, 2933: 35.

Tomopterna hieroglyphica — Deckert, 1938, Sitzungsber. Ges. Naturforsch. Freunde Berlin, 1938: 142.

Tomopterna kachowskii — Zimkus and Larson, 2011, Zootaxa, 2933: 27.

Common Names

Kachowski's Sand Frog (Channing and Rödel, 2019, Field Guide Frogs & Other Amph. Afr.: 380; Spawls, Mazuch, and Mohammad, 2023, Handb. Amph. Rept. NE Afr.: 122).

Distribution

Central Ethiopia into Eritrea, Djibouti, northwestern Somalia, and Red Sea hills of eastern Sudan, 200 to 2500 m elevation, and towards and probably extending into Djibouti.

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan

Comment

Resurrected from the synonymy of Tomopterna cryptotis by Zimkus and Larson, 2011, Zootaxa, 2933: 27–45, where it had been placed by Largen and Borkin, 2000, Bull. Zool. Nomencl., 57: 32. Whenever Chiromantis kachowskii and Rana cryptotis compete for seniority, priority is given to Rana cryptotis Boulenger, 1907, by Opinion 1983, Anonymous, 2001, Bull. Zool. Nomencl., 58: 243–244. Channing and Howell, 2006, Amph. E. Afr.: 329–330, provided an account as Tomopterna cryptotis for East Africa, which presumably would now be assigned to either Tomopterna gallmanni or Tomopterna wambensis. See account, photograph, and map for Ethiopia by Largen and Spawls, 2010, Amph. Rept. Ethiopia Eritrea: 194–196 (as Tompterna cryptotis). Freilich, Anadón, Bukala, Calderon, Chakraborty, and Boissinot, 2016, BMC Evol. Biol., 16 (206): 1–19, reported on the molecular phylogeography in Ethiopia. Channing and Rödel, 2019, Field Guide Frogs & Other Amph. Afr.: 380–381, provided a brief account, photograph, and range map. Spawls, Mazuch, and Mohammad, 2023, Handb. Amph. Rept. NE Afr.: 122–123, provided an account addressing identification, natural history, conservation status, and range, including a polygon map.

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