Sooglossidae

Sooglossidae, the Seychelles frogs or Seychelles Island frogs, are a family of frogs found on the Seychelles Islands.^[1] Until recently, this family was believed to include the genera Sechellophryne, Nesomantis and Sooglossus, but following a major revision of amphibians in 2006,^[2] the genus Nesomantis was named a junior synonym of Sooglossus.^[3] Their closest relatives are the purple frogs (Nasikabatrachidae) of India.^[4]

Seychelles frogs
Sechellophryne gardineri
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Amphibia
Order:	Anura
Superfamily:	Sooglossoidea
Family:	Sooglossidae Noble, 1931
Genera
2 genera (see text)

Description

All Sooglossidae species are relatively small terrestrial frogs, about 4 cm (1.6 in) in length, hiding under fallen leaves or in rock crevices. They are unusual for the neobatrachials, in that they undertake inguinal amplexus, a primitive version of amplexus. They lay their eggs on moist ground, rather than in water. Several species lack tadpoles, with the eggs hatching directly into froglets.^[5] The tadpoles of S. sechellensis are carried, abnormally, on the backs of the female frogs until metamorphosis.^[6]

There is no fossil record for the family. They diverged from the Nasikabatrachidae when the Seychelles Islands split from India during the Late Cretaceous. Their phylogenetic attributes are not fully understood but karyotypic studies demonstrate possible lineages from Madagascar due to pelobatid-leptodactyloid resemblances.^[7]

Taxonomy

The family was first described in 1931 by Gladwyn Kingsley Noble (1894–1940) and contains the following two genera with four species in total:^[1]

• Genus Sechellophryne Nussbaum and Wu, 2007
  • Sechellophryne gardineri (Gardiner's Seychelles frog)
  • Sechellophryne pipilodryas (Seychelles palm frog)
• Genus Sooglossus Boulenger, 1906
  • Sooglossus sechellensis (Seychelles frog)
  • Sooglossus thomasseti (Thomasset's frog)

Genetic analysis indicates that some of the species that occur on multiple islands should actually be divided into multiple different lineages or evolutionarily significant units, and possibly even distinct species.^[8]

References

1. Frost, Darrel R. (2022). "Sooglossidae Noble, 1931". Amphibian Species of the World: An Online Reference. Version 6.1. American Museum of Natural History. doi:10.5531/db.vz.0001. Retrieved 15 February 2022.
2. Frost, D. R.; Grant, T.; Faivovich, J. N.; Bain, R. H.; Haas, A.; Haddad, C. F. B.; De Sá, R. O.; Channing, A.; Wilkinson, M.; Donnellan, S. C.; Raxworthy, C. J.; Campbell, J. A.; Blotto, B. L.; Moler, P.; Drewes, R. C.; Nussbaum, R. A.; Lynch, J. D.; Green, D. M. & Wheeler, W. C. (2006). "The amphibian tree of life". Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History. 297: 1–291. doi:10.1206/0003-0090(2006)297[0001:TATOL]2.0.CO;2. hdl:2246/5781.
3. Frost, Darrel R. (2022). "Sooglossus Boulenger, 1906". Amphibian Species of the World: An Online Reference. Version 6.1. American Museum of Natural History. doi:10.5531/db.vz.0001. Retrieved 15 February 2022.
4. Franky Bossuyt; Biju, S. D. (October 2003). "New frog family from India reveals an ancient biogeographical link with the Seychelles". Nature. 425 (6959): 711–714. doi:10.1038/nature02019. ISSN 1476-4687. PMID 14562102.
5. Zweifel, Richard G. (1998). Cogger, H.G.; Zweifel, R.G. (eds.). Encyclopedia of Reptiles and Amphibians. San Diego: Academic Press. pp. 104–105. ISBN 0-12-178560-2.
6. Encyclopedia of Animals:Mammals, Birds, Reptiles, Amphibians
7. Nussbaum, Ronald (1979). "Mitotic Chromosomes of Sooglossidae (Amphibia: Anura)". Caryologia. 32 (3): 279–298. doi:10.1080/00087114.1979.10796793.
8. Groombridge, Jim J.; Taylor, Michelle L.; Bradfield, Kay S.; Maddock, Simon T.; Bunbury, Nancy; Chong-Seng, Lindsay; Griffiths, Richard A.; Labisko, Jim (2019). "Endemic, endangered and evolutionarily significant: cryptic lineages in Seychelles' frogs (Anura: Sooglossidae)". Biological Journal of the Linnean Society. 126 (3): 417–435. doi:10.1093/biolinnean/bly183. hdl:2436/622078.