French Frogs...and a lizard.

[GertJan Verspui]

Hello, I was in southern France and saw a lot of frogs, which I could not ID properly.
I hope one of you guys/ladies can help me out.
Of each one I cought I made 2 pics.

The first 6 are from the same river close to Privas in the Ardeche region.

1st frog

1st frogs leg

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2nd

2nd

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3rd

3rd

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4th

4th

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5th

5th

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6th

6th

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The next frogs are from the Gardon river, west of Pont du Gard.

7th

7th

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8th

8th

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At the Gardon river there were also a lot of lizards who looked like P. Muralis, but they were all more slim and with a more pointed head.
Here 2 pics of them, a drowned one and a living one.

Lizard

lizard

Good luck with my "problems"...

GertJan.

[Daniel Kane]

Hi GertJan,

As far as I know, the water frog possibilities in the area you visited are Pelophylax ridibundus, Pelophylax perezi, Pelophylax kl. grafi and possibly Pelophylax kl. esculenta and Pelophylax lessonae. For the last two species the Collins field guide shows a question mark (over the area you were) on their distribution maps, so I'm not sure if they are found there or not.

Frog 1: Marsh frog - Warty apperance, metatarsal tubercle small, frog itself looks fairly large.
Frog 2: Iberian Water Frog - Metatarsal tubercle small and flat
Frog 3: Iberian Water Frog - Smallish, flat metatarsal tubercle, pointed snout, greenish body with more brown coloured dorselateral folds.
Frog 4: Marsh Frog -
Frog 5: Marsh Frog - ear drum only half it's width from the eye, pretty small tubercle
Frog 6: Graf's Hybrid Frog - Ear drum
Frog 7: Marsh Frog
Frog 8: Marsh Frog

Lizard 1: Catalonian Wall Lizard - Striped, no reticulation on the body, fairly weak vertebral stripe
Lizard 2: Common Wall Lizard - Tail has white bars on the sides, reticulated pattern on the body.

Hope this helps. I am by no means an expert at identifying pelophylax frogs, but that's what I think.

[Mario Schweiger]

First I have to admit, I´m not really specialized in Pelophylax determination

According to:
MURATET, J. (2008): Identifier les Amphibiens de France metropolitaine

in the area Privas, only the "central European" species ridibundus, lessonae and esculentus are occuring.
So 1 & 4 should be esculentus, 2, 3, 5 & 6 should be ridibundus (but esculentus may look like everything from lessonae to ridibundus ).
For the Pont du Gard area I would say, both are kl. grafi.

Mario

[GertJan Verspui]

Daniel and Mario,

Thanks for your effort, Mario, are you sure that in the Privas region are no other Green frogs yet, 50km west of Valence, in Fay sur Lignon I found esculentus and their metararsal tubercle is very different from the ones in the Privas area.
Also a photo of an esculentus from the Meuse in the Verdun area.

esculentus from Fay sur Lignon

esculentus from Fay sur Lignon

Meuse

Meuse

My own thoughts about the frogs are:

1 & 4: March Frogs, triangular metararsal tubercle
2, 3, 5, 6: Iberian Water Frogs, rather small and flat metararsal tubercle
7 & 8: Maybe Grafs Hybrid Frogs, rather small, but more triangular metararsal tubercle

GertJan.

[Mario Schweiger]

GertJan,

please find attached page 252 (PDF) out of Muratet with the distribution map of perezi.
So Privas should be out of the range or at its most outer limits?

map of southern France with "Privas" marked

PeloPerez.pdf

(32.21 KiB) Downloaded 264 times

Mario

[Jeroen Speybroeck]

In my opinion, the main thing to remember here, is that it says that its distribution is poorly (if not hardly) known, Mario. Pelophylax ridibundus has taken over a huge portion of the natural range of perezi in France. Personally, I would not bet my life on your identification attempts ; adding ridibundus to the perezi-grafi mix makes it crazy. Just a few weeks ago, I even wondered about bedriagae in Massif des Maures... My (personal) conclusion: forget about it, without molecular sampling. There's a relevant paper (incl molecular stuff), demonstrating this mix, but I cannot seem to locate it straightaway...

[Mario Schweiger]

Yes, thats what I´m thinking about too
Just call it the "wet green ones" , if you havn`t molecular data (nucleus, and NOT mtDNA).

Mario

[GertJan Verspui]

Nasty frogs, keep to your own kind and start carrying ID's.

At the Privas area I also saw and cought a white with light grey big frog with a light blue line on its back.

Very very goodlooking frog, but some one stupid (me) let it escape above the water, so it was never seen again, it would have been a good one to become a famous photo model...

(thanks Mario and Jeroen)