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

Lithobates maculatus (Brocchi, 1877)

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Ranidae > Genus: Lithobates > Species: Lithobates maculatus

Rana maculata Brocchi, 1877, Bull. Soc. Philomath., Paris, Ser. 7, 1: 178. Syntypes: MNHNP 6412, 6412A, 6412B; MNHNP 6412A designated lectotype by Smith, Lynch, and Reese, 1966, Bull. Zool. Nomencl., 23: 171. Type locality: "Totonicapam (Mexique)" = Totonicapan, Guatemala. Preoccupied by Rana maculata Daudin in Sonnini de Manoncourt and Latreille, 1801 "An. X", Hist. Nat. Rept., 2: 161; Daudin, 1802 "An. XI", Hist. Nat. Rain. Gren. Crap., Quarto: 57; Daudin, 1803 "An. XI", Hist. Nat. Gen. Part. Rept., 8: 111. A nomen protectum under Art. 23.9 (International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, 1999); see Rana maculata Daudin, 1801, a nomen oblitum under this same rule.

Rana melanosoma Günther, 1900, Biol. Centr. Amer., Rept. Batr., Vol. 7, Part 153: 203. Syntypes: BMNH 1947.2.2.14–16 (formerly 1894.7.26.53–55) according to museum records. Type localities: "Guatemala, Dueñas . . . ; Nicaragua, Hacienda Rosa de Jericho, 3250 feet". Synonymy with Rana palmipes by Boulenger, 1901, Zool. Rec., 37: 27; Taylor, 1952, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 35: 908. Synonym with Rana maculata by Hillis and de Sá, 1988, Herpetol. Monogr., 2: 9.

Rana maculata maculata — Smith, 1959, Herpetologica, 15: 215.

Rana maculata krukoffi Smith, 1959, Herpetologica, 15: 215. Holotype: UIMNH 10526, by original designation. Type locality: "Finca Juárez, 7 leagues NE Escuintla, Chiapas", Mexico.

Rana (Rana) maculata — Dubois, 1987 "1986", Alytes, 5: 41–42, by implication.

Rana (Sierrana) maculata — Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 330.

Rana (Novirana, Sierrana, Ranula, Levirana) maculata — Hillis and Wilcox, 2005, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 34: 305. See Dubois, 2006, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 42: 317–330, Hillis, 2007, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 42: 331–338, and Dubois, 2007, Cladistics, 23: 390–402, for relevant discussion of nomenclature. Invalid name formulation under the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (1999) as discussed by Dubois, 2007, Cladistics, 23: 395.

Lithobates maculatus — 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: 369. Che, Pang, Zhao, Wu, Zhao, and Zhang, 2007, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 43: 1–13, by implication.

Lithobates (Lithobates) melanosoma — Dubois, 2006, C. R. Biol., Paris, 329: 829; Dubois, 2006, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 42: 325.

Rana (Levirana) maculata — Hillis, 2007, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 42: 335–336, by implication.

Lithobates maculate — Liner and Casas-Andreu, 2008, Herpetol. Circ., 38: 16. Incorrect subsequent spelling.

Rana (Lithobates) maculata — Yuan, Zhou, Chen, Poyarkov, Chen, Jang-Liaw, Chou, Matzke, Iizuka, Min, Kuzmin, Zhang, Cannatella, Hillis, and Che, 2016, Syst. Biol., 65: 835.

Common Names

Highland Frog (Liner, 1994, Herpetol. Circ., 23: 27; Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 108).

Masked Mountain Frog (Campbell, 1998, Amph. Rept. N. Guatemala Yucatan Belize: 95; Liner and Casas-Andreu, 2008, Herpetol. Circ., 38: 16).

Distribution

Moderate to high elevations (800–2700 m) from eastern Oaxaca (east of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec), Mexico, south and east to central Nicaragua.

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua

Comment

In the Rana (Sierrana) maculata group of Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 330. In the Rana palmipes group as defined by by Hillis and de Sá, 1988, Herpetol. Monogr., 2: 1–26, who discussed the nomenclatural problems with this taxon and who noted that records of this species from lowland areas of Nicaragua are based on misidentified specimens of Rana vaillanti. See comment under Rana macroglossa. See accounts by Campbell, 1998, Amph. Rept. N. Guatemala Yucatan Belize: 95, Savage, 2002, Amph. Rept. Costa Rica: 401 (who discussed confusion with Rana taylori), and McCranie and Wilson, 2002, Amph. Honduras: 485–490. Köhler, Veselý, and Greenbaum, 2005 "2006", Amph. Rept. El Salvador: 68–70, provided an account (as Rana maculata, and for El Salvador) and a color photograph. McCranie, 2007, Herpetol. Rev., 38: 38, summarized the departmental distribution in Honduras. Köhler, 2011, Amph. Cent. Am.: 291–295, provided a brief summary of natural history and identification key for the species of Lithobates in Central America and provided a range map and photograph for this species. Coelho, Camurugi, and Garda, 2023, Organisms Divers. Evol., 23: 967–981, reported on niche divergence, phylogenetics, and biogeography as part of the Lithobates palmipes group (as the Rana palmipes group). Martínez-Fonseca, Holmes, Sunyer, Westeen, Grundler, Cerda, Fernández-Mena, Loza-Molina, Monagan, Nondorf, Pandelis, and Rabosky, 2024, Check List, 20: 74–76, provided and discussed a record from Las Brisas del Mogotón, Departamento Nueva Segovia, Nicaragua.

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