A team of researchers has found a new species of leopard frog that for years biologists mistook for a more widespread variety of leopard frog.
The newly discovered frog species Rana sp. nov. (Brian Curry)
While biologists regularly discover new species in remote rain forests, finding this one in the ponds and marshes of Staten Island, mainland New York and New Jersey is a big surprise, said the researchers from the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA), Rutgers University, the University of California in Davis, and the University of Alabama who worked together to make the unexpected discovery.
“For a new species to go unrecognized for all this time in this area is amazing,” said Professor Brad Shaffer from UCLA, a co-author of the discovery. “Many amphibians are secretive and can be very hard to find, but these frogs are pretty obvious, out-there animals. This shows that even in the largest city in the U.S. there are still new and important species waiting to be discovered that could be lost without conservation.”
In a study, published online in the journal Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, the team used DNA data to compare the new frog to all other leopard frog species in the region and determined that it is an entirely new species, soon to be named.
The unnamed frog joins a crowd of more than a dozen distinct leopard frog species. The newly identified wetland species likely once lived on Manhattan, and though it’s now only known to live in a few nearby locations, Yankee Stadium in the Bronx would be the bull’s-eye of a target drawn around its current range.
“There were northern and southern leopard frogs species in that general area, so I was expecting to find one of those that for some reason had atypical behaviors or that were hybrids of both,” said Cathy Newman, a lead author and an evolutionary biologist at the University of Alabama. “I was really surprised and excited once I started getting data back strongly suggesting it was a new species. It’s fascinating in such a heavily urbanized area.”
The newly identified frog species has so far been found in scattered populations in northern New Jersey, southeastern mainland New York, and on Staten Island. Although they may even extend into parts of Connecticut and extreme northeastern Pennsylvania, evidence suggests they were once common on Long Island and other nearby regions but went extinct there in just the last few decades, the researchers noted.
“The extensive extinctions over the last few decades raise added conservation concerns that must be addressed,” said Prof. Joanna Burger of Rutgers University. “It is amazing to discover a new frog in Rutgers backyard and the metropolitan area of New York and New Jersey.”
“This frog was probably once more widely distributed,” explained Leslie Rissler, an associate professor of biological sciences at the University of Alabama. “They are still able to hang on. They are still here, and that is amazing.”
Until the scientists settle on a new name, they refer to the frog as Rana sp. nov., meaning “new frog species” – though more often they’re apt to call it “the weird Rana,” one researcher confessed.
