HTTPS://JOURNALS.KU.EDU/REPTILESANDAMPHIBIANSTABLE OF CONTENTS IRCF REPTILES & AMPHIBIANSREPTILES • VOL &15, AMPHIBIANS NO 4 • DEC 2008 • 27(3):446–449189 • DEC 2020 IRCF REPTILES & AMPHIBIANS CONSERVATION AND NATURAL HISTORY TABLE OF CONTENTS FEATUREA New ARTICLES Record of the Myristica Swamp . Chasing Bullsnakes (Pituophis catenifer sayi) in Wisconsin: Treefrog,On the Road to Understanding Mercurana the Ecology and Conservation of the Midwest’s myristicapalustris Giant Serpent ...................... Joshua M. Kapfer 190 . The Shared History of Treeboas (Corallus grenadensis) and Humans on Grenada: A(Anura: Hypothetical Excursion ............................................................................................................................ Rhacophoridae), fromRobert W. Henderson the 198 RESEARCH ARTICLES Vazhachal. The Texas Horned Lizard in Central Reserve and Western Texas ....................... Forest, Emily Henry, Jason Brewer, Kerala, Krista Mougey, and Gad PerryIndia 204 . The Knight Anole (Anolis equestris) in Florida .............................................Brian J. Camposano, Kenneth L. Krysko, Kevin M. Enge, Ellen M. Donlan, and Michael Granatosky 212 Sujith V. Gopalan1, Sanil George2, and D.A. Evans1 CONSERVATION ALERT 1Department of Zoology, University College, Trivandrum. Research Centre, University of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India ([email protected]) .2World’sChemical Mammals & Environmental in Crisis ............................................................................................................................... Biology Group, Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology, Thiruvananthapuram,.............................. Kerala, 220 India . More Than Mammals ...................................................................................................................................................................... 223 . The “Dow Jones Index” of Biodiversity ........................................................................................................................................... 225 HUSBANDRY he Western. CaptiveGhats Care are of the aCentral hotspot Netted Dragon for .......................................................................................................biodiversity Total genomic DNA Shannon was isolatedPlummer 226from the toe clip using T(Gunawardene et al. 2007). The Asian treefrog or glid- a DNeasy Blood and Tissue Kit (Qiagen). Fragments of ing frog familyPROFILE Rhacophoridae comprises 431 species in 20 mitochondrial 16S rRNA were amplified via PCR with the . genera (AmphibiaWebKraig Adler:2020), A Lifetime of which Promoting 43 Herpetology species ................................................................................................have been primers 16SF (F-5’-CGCCTGTTTATCAAAAACAT-3’) Michael L. Treglia 234 reported from COMMENTARYthe state of Kerala, which includes portions and 16SR (R-5’-CCGGTCTGAACTCAGATCACGT-3’) of the Western Ghats. The Turtles (Das Have 2015). Been Watching The Me Myristica ........................................................................................................................ Swamp (Palumbi et al. 1991). PCR Ericwas Gangloff performed 238 in 25 μl reactions Treefrog (MercuranaBOOK REVIEWmyristicapalustris) is endemic to the consisting of 2.5 μl each of 10x PCR buffer, MgCl2 (25 mM) Western Ghats (Abraham. Threatened Amphibianset al. 2013). of the WorldThis edited frog by exhibits S.N. Stuart, a M. Hoffmann, J.S. Chanson, N.A. Cox, unique reproductiveR. behavior, Berridge, P. Ramani, which and B.E.is documented Young .............................................................................................................. to be Robert Powell 243 a combination of both explosive and prolonged breeding strategies, making CONSERVATION it widely adapted RESEARCH to life REPORTS: in the Summariesswamps of Published Conservation Research Reports ................................. 245 NATURAL HISTORY RESEARCH REPORTS: Summaries of Published Reports on Natural History ................................. 247 (Abraham et al. 2018).NEWBRIEFS These ............................................................................................................................... frogs are known to occur on ....................................................... 248 the periphery of theEDITORIAL Kulathupuzha INFORMATION Reserve ............................................................................................................................... Forest, which is ...................... 251 outside the protectedFOCUS area ON network, CONSERVATION and from: A theProject Shendurney You Can Support ............................................................................................... 252 Wildlife Sanctuary in Kollam District (8.868°N, 77.094°E), the Peppara Wildlife Sanctuary at Thiruvananthapuram (8.670°N, 77.120°E), Ammayambalam of the Kulathupuzha Reserve Forest (8.841°N, 77.035Front°E), Cover. and Shannon the Plummer.Sasthanada Back Cover. Michael Kern Totat et velleseque audant mo Totat et velleseque audant mo Swamp in the Aripa Forestestibus 3.8 inveliquo km veliquesoutheast rerchil of estibus inveliquo velique rerchil Ammayambalam (Abraham et al.erspienimus, 2013, 2018). quos accullabo. To date, Ilibus the erspienimus, quos accullabo. Ilibus aut dolor apicto invere pe dolum aut dolor apicto invere pe dolum known range of the species has beenfugiatis restricted maionsequat to eumque the lowland fugiatis maionsequat eumque Myristica Swamps south of the Shencottahmoditia erere nonsedis Gap. ma Herein sectiatur we moditia erere nonsedis ma sectia- report the species from the Vazhachalma derrovitae Reserve voluptam, Forest as quosnorth of tur ma derrovitae voluptam, as accullabo. the Shencottah Gap (Fig. 1). During a field study conducted at the Vazhachal Forest Division from June 2018 to August 2019, we identified an active breeding site of an unidentified rhacophorid in the Sukthae Pocket Swamp, Vazhachal Reserve Forest, on 8 June Fig. 1. Map showing known localities for the Myristica Swamp Treefrog 2018 (10.298°N, 76.658°E). We collected an adult male (Mercurana myristicapalustris) in the southern Western Ghats, Kerala, India. (Fig. 2), which we tentatively identified as Mercurana myris- Records previously published by Abraham et al. (2013) are marked by green ticapalustris based on descriptions in Abraham et al. (2013). dots: 1 = Peppara Wildlife Sanctuary, 2 = Kulathupuzha Reserve Forest, 3 = To confirm the identity of the frog, we removed a toe clip, Shendurney Wildlife Sanctuary. The new locality in the Vazhachal Reserve Forest is indicated by the yellow pentagram. The approximate extent of the which we preserved in 100% ethanol and stored at –20 °C. Western Ghats is shown in the inset map in gray; the smaller black area The specimen was vouchered in 70% ethanol. corresponds to the area shown in the larger map. Copyright is held by the authors. Articles in R&A are made available under a 446 Reptiles & Amphibians ISSN 1098-6324 Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license. GOPALAN ET AL. REPTILES & AMPHIBIANS • 27(3):446–449 • DEC 2020 Fig. 2. The Myristica Swamp Treefrog (Mercurana myristicapalustris) in natural habitat: Male vocalizing from a branch perch (A & B), forest floor in the swamp in the early monsoon season (C), Gowrimara (Polyalthia fragrans), the predominant plant species in the swamp (D). Photographs by Sujith V. Gopalan. and 0.5 μl dNTPs (2 mM), 0.25 μl of each primer (10 μM), generated in the present study for comparison. As outgroups, 1 μl of Taq DNA polymerase (Phire Hot start DNA poly- we used additional sequences of three sister taxa (Ghatixalus merase), 14 μl of dH2O and 4 μl of template DNA (10-20 asterops, Polypedates pseudocruciger, and Polypedates maculatus) ng). The following thermocycling conditions were used for from GenBank (accession nos: KT359626.1, KU169984.1, amplifications: 95 °C for 5 min, followed by 32 cycles of 95 and EU449995.1, respectively). Sequences were aligned °C for 30 sec, 58 °C for 40 sec, 72 °C for 90 sec, followed by using ClustalW, built-in BIOEDIT (Thompson et al. 1994; a final extension step at 72 °C for 5 min. The PCR products Hall 1999). For both genes, the best-fit nucleotide substitu- were visualized on 1% agarose gels and purified using Exo tion model was selected as GTR + G + I using the model Sap IT (USB). Sequencing was performed using the PCR test implemented in MEGA ver. 5 (Tamura et al. 2011). The primers and products were labeled with BigDye Terminator phylogenetic position of the species was determined using V.3.1 Cycle Sequencing Kit (Applied Biosystems, Inc) and the maximum likelihood method as implemented in MEGA sequenced in an ABI 3730 capillary sequencer following ver. 5 (Tamura et al. 2011). The branch support was evalu- manufacturer’s instructions. The new sequence is deposited ated using 1,000 bootstrap replicates (Felsenstein 1985). The in GenBank under accession number MT913017. pairwise genetic distances between the species were calcu- We used 16S rRNA reference sequences of M. myristica- lated using the Kimura 2-parameter method in MEGA ver. 5 palustris (KC594294.1), Beddomixalus bijui (KC594290.1), (Tamura et al. 2011). Rhacophorus malabaricus (KU169992.1), Raorchestes jayarami Morphological measurements of the adult male col- (KU169989.1), Raorchestes ponmudi (KM596576.1), lected among many actively vocalizing males from an active Pseudophilautus amboli (KU169982.1),