Rana chensinensis David, 1875

Class: Amphibia > Order: Anura > Family: Ranidae > Genus: Rana > Species: Rana chensinensis

Rana chensinensis David, 1875, J. Trois. Voy. Explor. Emp. Chinoise, 1: 159. Type(s): Not stated; possibly MNHNP 1347 (4 specimens) collected by David and labelled as Rana temporaria from "Mongolia" according to XXX. Type locality: "Inkiapo [= Yinjiapo] . . . Lao yu [River]", Qin Ling] Mountains, above 1000 m alt. ["le baromètre marque 661 millimètres"], Shaanxi Province, China. Given as "Tsinling Mts., S. Shensi" by Gee and Boring, 1929, Peking Nat. Hist. Bull., 4: 28.

Rana temporaria chensinensisBoring, 1938 "1938–1939", Peking Nat. Hist. Bull., 13: 105. Pope and Boring, 1940, Peking Nat. Hist. Bull., 15: 57; Tomasik, 1967, Przeglad Zoologiczny, 11: 367–368; Okada, 1966, Fauna Japon., Anura: 74.

Rana chensinensisKawamura, 1962, J. Sci. Hiroshima Univ., B—Zool., 20: 181–193. Tomasik, 1967, Przeglad Zoologiczny, 11: 367.

Rana (Rana) chensinensisDubois, 1987 "1986", Alytes, 5: 41, by implication; Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 333; Yuan, Zhou, Chen, Poyarkov, Chen, Jang-Liaw, Chou, Matzke, Iizuka, Min, Kuzmin, Zhang, Cannatella, Hillis, and Che, 2016, Syst. Biol., 65: 835.

Rana (Laurasiarana) chensinensisHillis and Wilcox, 2005, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 34: 311, by implication; see Dubois, 2006, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 42: 317–330, and Hillis, 2007, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 42: 331–338, for discussion.

English Names

Far Eastern Wood Frog (Borkin and Kuzmin, 1988, in Vorobyeva and Darevsky (eds.), Amph. Rept. Mongolian P. Rep.: 248).

North China Wood Frog (Ananjeva, Borkin, Darevsky, and Orlov, 1988, Dict. Amph. Rept. Five Languages: 121).

Asiatic Grass Frog (Ananjeva, Borkin, Darevsky, and Orlov, 1988, Dict. Amph. Rept. Five Languages: 121).

Inkiapo Frog (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 107).

Chinese Brown Frog (Fei, 1999, Atlas Amph. China: 156).

Eastern Frog (Kuzmin, Dunayev, Munkhbayar, Munkhbaatar, and Terbish, 2017, in Kuzmin (ed.), Amph. Mongolia: 194). 

Distribution

Eastern Mongolia and China (Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan, Henan, Hebei, Liaoning, Beijing, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, Inner Mongolia). See comment. 

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: China, People's Republic of, Mongolia

Comment

In the Section Rana, subgenus Rana, Rana chensinensis group of Dubois, 1992, Bull. Mens. Soc. Linn. Lyon, 61: 333. Often confused with Rana amurensis, Rana asiatica, and Rana kukunoris. In the Rana chensinensis group of Fei, Ye, Huang, Jiang, and Xie, 2005, in Fei et al. (eds.), Illust. Key Chinese Amph.: 107. Sometimes treated as a subspecies of Rana temporaria. Considered a distinct species by Kawamura, 1962, J. Sci. Hiroshima Univ., B—Zool., 20: 181–193; Borkin, 1975 "1974", Tezisy Dokladov Zool. Inst. Akad. Nauk SSSR, Leningrad, 1974: 6–7 (who briefly summarized the synonymy); and by Orlova, Bakharev, and Borkin, 1977, Trudy Zool. Inst. Akad. Nauk SSSR, Leningrad, 74: 84–85. See also Liu and Hu, 1961, Tailless Amph. China: 183–188, for Chinese populations; Nakamura and Ueno, 1963, Japan. Rept. Amph. Color: 43–44, for Japanese population; and Orlova, Bakharev, and Borkin, 1977, Trudy Zool. Inst. Akad. Nauk SSSR, Leningrad, 74: 81–103, for Russian population, and synonymy of Rana semiplicata Nikolskii, 1918. See comment under Rana dybowski. Wei and Chen, 1990, Acta Zool. Sinica, 36: 76–81, discussed phylogenetic relationships of four subspecies and provided a cladogram of these; except for Rana chensinensis sensu stricto, these other races have been transferred to the synonymies of Rana dybowskii and Rana kukunoris. Matsui, 1991, Japan. J. Herpetol., 14: 63–78, discussed the existence of cryptic species under this binomial. Four subspecies recognized by Wei, Chen, Xu, and Li, 1991, Acta Zootaxon. Sinica, 16: 375–382; these subspecies rejected by Zhao and Adler, 1993, Herpetol. China: 141. See account by Ye, Fei, and Hu, 1993, Rare and Economic Amph. China: 212. Matsui, Bassarukin, Kasugai, Tanabe, and Takenaka, 1994, Alytes, 12: 1–14, reported on taxonomic difficulties regarding populations from Sakhalin, seemingly intermediate between Rana dybowskii and Rana pirica. Kuzmin, 1999, Amph. Former Soviet Union: 356, discussed the composite nature of this nominal species and treated this taxon as part of Rana dybowskii pending resolution of the taxonomic problems in the Russian Far East. See comment under Rana pirica regarding population on Sakhalin I. Formerly associated with this species. Xie, Ye, Fei, Jiang, Zeng, and Matsui, 1999, Acta Zootaxon. Sinica, 24: 224–231, noted that populations formerly associated with this binominal in northeastern China were best referred to Rana dybowskii. Fei, 1999, Atlas Amph. China: 156–157, provided an account (sensu including Rana dybowskii), map, and figure. See comment under Rana kukunoris. Fei and Ye, 2001, Color Handbook Amph. Sichuan: 171, provided a brief account and illustration. See also brief account by Zhao and Yang, 1997, Amph. Rept. Hengduan Mountains Region: 86–88. Sumida, Ueda, and Nishioka, 2003, Zool. Sci., Tokyo, 20: 567–580, presented evidence from reproductive incompatability and molecular relationships that populations from the Maritime Province of Russia and the vicinity of Beijing, China, do not represent the same species, this view being consistent with the views expressed by Kuzmin and Maslova, 2003, Adv. Amph. Res. Former Soviet Union, 8: 215, that the populations from the Russian Far East must be referred to Rana dybowskii. Fan, Guo, and Liu, 1998, Amph. Rept. Shanxi Prov.: 57–60, provided an account for Shanxi. See comment under Rana dybowskii. Li, Lu, and Li, 2005, Sichuan J. Zool., 24: 268–270, provided a distribution map for China. Li, Lu, Wang, Wang, Fang, and Li, 2005, Herpetol. Sinica, 10: 63–67, compared this species in northeastern China with Rana zhenhaiensis, Rana dybowskii, Rana amurensis, Rana huanrenensis, and Rana kukunoris. Fei, Hu, Ye, and Huang, 2009, Fauna Sinica, Amph. 3: 1004–1010, provided an account for China and included it in their Rana asiatica group. Fei, Ye, and Jiang, 2010, Colored Atlas of Chinese Amph.: 266–267, provided a brief account including photographs of specimens and habitat. Zhou, Wen, Fu, Xu, Jin, Ding, Min, Che, and Zhang, 2012, Mol. Ecol., 21: 960–973, reported on phylogenetics and biogeography of the Rana chensinensis complex, noting that "Rana chensinensis" from the Loess Plateau is an unnamed species. Fei, Ye, and Jiang, 2012, Colored Atlas Chinese Amph. Distr.: 300–301, provided an account, photographs, and a range map for China.  Terbish, Munkhbayar, and Munkhbaatar, 2013, Guide Amph. Rept. Mongolia: 22–23, provided a brief account, photograph, and spot map for Mongolia. Pan, Zhou, Shi, Zhao, Chen, Wang, Chu, Pu, Gu, and Zhang, 2014, Chinese J. Zool., 49: 195–206, reported the species from the Dabie Mountains of Anhui, China. See detailed account for Mongolia by Kuzmin, Dunayev, Munkhbayar, Munkhbaatar, and Terbish, 2017, in Kuzmin (ed.), Amph. Mongolia: 184–201. Yao and Gong, 2012, Amph. Rept. Gansu: 52–53, provided a brief account for Gansu and photographs. Shen, Xu, Yang, Chen, Xiao, and Chen, 2022, Asian Herpetol. Res., 13: 145–158, noted that records from Beijing City, Hebei Province, and the southeastern Taihang Mountains of Henan Province, China, are reassigned to Rana taihangensis

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