| Israel painted frog | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Amphibia |
| Order: | Anura |
| Family: | Discoglossidae |
| Genus: | Discoglossus |
| Species: | D. nigriventer |
| Binomial name | |
| Discoglossus nigriventer Mendelssohn & Steinitz, 1943 |
|
The Israel painted frog, or Hula painted frog (Discoglossus nigriventer) is an amphibian, thought to be extinct until one female specimen was found on 16 November 2011. It is endemic to the Lake Hula marshes in Israel.
The deliberate draining of Lake Hula and its marshes in the 1950s was thought to have led to the extinction of this frog, along with the cyprinid fish Acanthobrama hulensis and cichlid fish Tristramella intermedia.
Contents |
The Israel painted frog has a dark belly with small white spots. It is colored ochre above with a rusty colour grading into dark olive-grey to greyish-black on the sides. Differences from the common painted frog (Discoglossus pictus) include its greater interocular distance, longer forelimbs, and a less projecting snout. The type specimen was an adult female with a body length of 40 mm.
Little is known about its history, because few specimens have been found by scientists. Two adults and two tadpoles were collected in 1940 and a single specimen was found in 1955. This would prove to be the last record of this species until 2011.[1]
The four 1940 specimens were to be used as types, but the smaller, half-grown frog was eaten by the larger one in captivity.[2] The latter eventually became the holotype (HUJZ Amphib. Discogl. 1) for the species' description and this or the individual collected in 1955 apparently is the only material remains of the species known today; the two tadpole paratypes (HUJZ Amphib. Discogl. 2 and 2a) appear to have been lost.
The IUCN has classified this species as extinct since 1996[3] but Israel continued to list it as an endangered species in the slim hope that a relict population may be found in the Golan Heights.
In 2000, a scientist from the Lebanese nature protection organisation A Rocha claimed he had seen a frog species which could be Discoglossus nigriventer in the Aammiq marshes south of the Beqaa Valley in Lebanon. Two French-Lebanese-British expeditions in the years 2004 and 2005 yielded no confirmation as to the further existence of this species.[4] In August 2010, a search organised by the Amphibian Specialist Group of the International Union for Conservation of Nature set out to look for various species of frogs thought to be extinct in the wild, including the Israel painted frog.[5]
In 2011, a routine patrol at Ha'Hula lake found an unknown frog, and scientists have confirmed that it is one of this rare species.[6] An ecologist with the Israel Nature and Parks Authority credited the rehydration of the area for the frog sighting.[7] On November 29, a second individual was located in the same area.[8]