Indosylvirana nicobariensis (Stoliczka, 1870)

English Names

Nicobar Island Frog (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 108; Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Gururaja, and Bhatta, 2009, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, Occas. Pap., 302: 78).

Cricket Frog (Iskandar, 1998, Amph. Java Bali: 69).

Nicobarese Frog (Das and Dutta, 1998, Hamadryad, 23: 66; Mathew and Sen, 2010, Pict. Guide Amph. NE India: 83).

Nicobar Frog (Chanda, 2002, Handb. Indian Amph.: 131).

Nicobar Cricket Frog (Chan-ard, 2003, Photograph. Guide Amph. Thailand: 132).

Nicobarese Frog (Harikrishnan and Vasudevan, 2018, Alytes, 36: 255). 

Distribution

Palawan Island and Sulu Archipelago (Philippines); Bali to peninsular Thailand including Sumatra (including the Mentawai Islands) and Borneo (Malaysia, Indonesia, and likely to be found in Brunei); Nicobar Islands (Car Nicobar, Tillangchong, Tarasa, Katchal, Camorta, Nancowry, Pilo Milo, Little Nicobar, and Great Nicobar). See comment below. 

Comment

Prior to the revision of 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, placed in Section Hylarana, subsection Hydrophylax, subgenus Sylvirana of Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 326. Synonymy and discussion in Boulenger, 1920, Rec. Indian Mus., 20: 162; Taylor, 1962, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 43: 430-433; Bourret, 1942, Batr. Indochine: 343-346; Inger, 1954, Fieldiana, Zool., 33: 331-333; Inger, 1966, Fieldiana, Zool., 52: 223-228; and Berry, 1975, Amph. Fauna Peninsular Malaysia: 80-81. Chanda, 2002, Handb. Indian Amph.: 131, provided a brief account (as Rana nicobarensis [sic]). See identification table by Manthey and Grossmann, 1997, Amph. Rept. Südostasiens: 84-86, to compare this species to other ranids of the Sunda Shelf region. Malkmus, Manthey, Vogel, Hoffmann, and Kosuch, 2002, Amph. Rept. Mount Kinabalu: 165-166, provided an account (as Rana nicobariensis). Chan-ard, 2003, Photograph. Guide Amph. Thailand: 132-133, provided a very brief account (as Rana nicobariensis), map for Thailand, and photograph. McKay, 2006, Field Guide Amph. Rept. Bali: 39-40, provided a brief account and photograph. Chan-ard, Thong-aree, Cota, and Makchai, 2011, Thailand Nat. Hist. Mus. J., 5: 147–149, reported the species from Selangor, Pahang, and Narathiwat provinces, and discussed the latter, new record in detail. Chan-ard, Cota, and Makchai, 2011, Amph. E. Region Thailand: 146, detailed the range in Thailand. Shahriza and Ibrahim, 2014, Check List, 10: 253–259, provided a photograph and brief natural history observations for a population in Kedah, West Malaysia. Hasan, Islam, Khan, Igawa, Alam, Tjong, Kurniawan, Joshy, Yong, Belabut, Kurabayashi, Kuramoto, and Sumida, 2014, Turkish J. Zool., 38: 389, suggested on the basis of 16S divergence that the population on Muaru Siberu (near Sumatra) may be an unnamed species. Harikrishnan and Vasudevan, 2018, Alytes, 36: 254–255, commented on the distribution and natural history in the Nicobar Islands, India (although confirmation of identification is required). Haas, Kueh, Joseph, bin Asri, Das, Hagmann, Schwander, and Hertwig, 2018, Evol. Syst., 2: 89–114, provided a brief account of morphology and natural history for the Sabah population. Niyomwan, Srisom, and Pawangkhanant, 2019, Field Guide Amph. Thailand: 316–317, provided a brief account (description, photographs, habitat, and range) for Thailand (in Thai). Chan, Hutter, Wood, Grismer, and Brown, 2020, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 151 (106899): 1–16, transferred the species to Indosylvirana and provided evidence that it is a species complex. Chandramouli, Hamidy, and Amarasinghe, 2020, Taprobanica, 9: 126, transferred this species to Bijurana; see comment under the generic record.  Lalronunga, Vanramliana, Sailo, Zosangliana, Lalmuanpuia, Lalhmangaiha, Sailo, Lalrinchhana, and Lalhmingliani, 2021, Zootaxa, 4952: 596–600, implied that all record of Indosylvirana nicobariensis from mainland India and Bangladesh are referrable to this species, although confirmation is required.  Mathew and Sen, 2010, Pict. Guide Amph. NE India: 83, provided a brief characterization and photograph and confusingly suggested the species to occur in Assam, Mizoram, and Tripura, India. The status of the reports by Dutta, 1997, Amph. India Sri Lanka: 161-162, who provided a range, systematic comments, and partial taxonomic bibliography and of Chanda, 2002, Handb. Indian Amph.: 131, who provided a brief account (as Rana nicobarensis [sic]) is questionable now that mainland Indian records have been transferred to Sylvirana lacrima. Haas, Das, Hertwig, Bublies, and Schulz-Schaeffer, 2022, Guide to the Tadpoles of Borneo: 336–338, summarized the knowledge of habitat, reproduction, larval morphology and coloration.

External links:

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• For related information on conservation and images as well as observation see iNaturalist; for a quick link to their maps see iNaturalist KML
• For access to available specimen data for this species, from over 350 scientific collections, go to Vertnet.