Leptodactylus
Leptodactylus is a genus of leptodactylid frogs. It includes the species commonly called ditch frogs or white-lipped frogs. It is very similar to Physalaemus, a close relative, and indeed the 2005 described Leptodactylus lauramiriamae is in some aspects intermediate between them.

Uncredited · Public Domain · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.
On record
Recorded, not inferred- Also called
- White-lipped frogsPBDB
- Sits inside
- LeptodactylinaePBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Life habit
- amphibiousPBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Environment
- brackish,freshwater,terrestrialPBDB, for Tetrapoda
Time the record covers
At least 5.3 million years on record.
The record covers at least 5.333 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 11.63 Mya to 0 Mya.
5 occurrences of Leptodactylus on record, most of them in the Pliocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.
When
5 occurrences- Miocene20%
- Pliocene40%
- Pleistocene20%
- Holocene20%
These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.
Found in
3 formations
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The named rock units Leptodactylus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Leptodactylus and its relatives
PlioceneWhere Leptodactylus and its relatives were recorded in the Pliocene.
Found in the same rock
189 taxa- Ceratophrys2 sites
- Colubrinae2 sites
- Eumops perotis2 sites
- Actenomys priscus1 site
- Alitoxodon vetustus1 site
- Anas1 site
- Argyrolagus palmeri1 site
- Artibeus jamaicensis1 site
- Balantiopteryx io1 site
- Boa1 site
- Boidae1 site
- Bothrops1 site
- Bufo1 site
- Caimaninae1 site
- Callopistes1 site
- Calomys1 site
- Cardiomys1 site
- Cavia aperea1 site
- Caviodon australis1 site
- Chaetodipus hispidus1 site
- Chaetophractus vellerosus1 site
- Characidae1 site
- Chelidae1 site
- Chelonoidis1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 5 sites for Leptodactylus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.
This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.
Entered from
5 references- New vertebrates from the Ituzaingó Formation (Late Miocene of Entre Ríos Province, Argentina), including first records of Leptodactylus (Amphibia, Anura) and Chelonoidis (Testudines, Cryptodira)1
- Late Cenozoic vertebrates from the Southern Pampean region: systematic and bio-chronostratigraphic update1
- Oldest record of Leptodactylus Fitzinger, 1826 (Anura, Leptodactylidae) from the early Pliocene of the south american pampas1
- The Eocene to Pleistocene vertebrates of Bolivia and their stratigraphic context: a review1
- A small Pleistocene herpetofauna from Tamaulipas1
Each of the 5 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content2
Picture of Leptodactylus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- nobody named on the record
- Licence
- Public Domain
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
CT scan
- Source
- MorphoSource
- Licence
- not stated by the source
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
- Specimen
- Leptodactylus melanonotus · UF:Herp:168918
Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.
Keep going
What may have been alongside itLeptodactylinae through timeFormations of the PlioceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Fitzinger 1826