Greenhouse Frog (Eleutherodactylus planirostris)

An Annotated Bibliography of the Greenhouse Frog (Eleutherodactylus planirostris) in the Western Gulf Coast Segment of its Distribution.

by Tom Lott

[last updated 27 Novembery 2017]

Boundy, J. 1998. Distributional records for Louisiana amphibians.  Herpetol. Rev. 29: 251-252  [St. Bernard and St. John the Baptist parish records - TEL]

Boundy, J. 2004. Amphibian and reptile distribution records for Louisiana. Herpetol. Rev. 35: 194-196  [Lafayette Parish record - TEL]

Butterfield, B.P., W.E. Meshaka Jr. and C. Guyer. 1997. Nonindigenous amphibians and reptiles.  Pp. 123-138.  In Simberloff, D., D.C. Schmitz and T.C. Brown (Eds.), Strangers in Paradise: Impact and Management of Nonindigenous Species in Florida.  Island Press, Washington, D.C. [Extralimital but documents that this species can survive in non-edificarian habitats in peninsular Florida, as opposed to observations of Meshaka et al. (2009) for the species in Louisiana. - TEL]

Carey, S.D. 1982. Geographic distribution. Eleutherodactylus planirostris. Herpetological Review 13: 130.

Cope, E.D. 1863. On Trachycephalus, Scaphiopus and other American Batrachia.  Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci., Philadelphia 15: 43-54.

Deckert, R.F. 1921. Amphibian notes from Dade Co., Florida. Copeia 1921: 20-23.

Delis, P.R., H.R. Mushinsky, and E.D. McCoy. 1996. Decline of some west-central Florida anuran populations in response to habitat degradation. Biodiversity and Conservation 5: 1579– 1595.

Dinsmore, A. 2004. Geographic distribution: Eleutherodactylus planirostris (Greenhouse Frog).  Herpetol. Rev. 35(4): 403.  [Harrison County, MS record; established, overwintering population at Gulfport, 5.42 km south of I-10, one block from a nursery where the species is also established. Author states that first MS specimen was USNM 318495, collected by Ron Altig at an unknown date in Starkville, 422 km to the north of the present locality (unpublished?) - TEL]

Dixon, J.R., Hibbitts, T.J., and M.R.J. Forstner. 2007. Texas herpetological literature and county records 2000 to 2006-07.  Publ. Tex. Herpetol. Soc. 1(1):1-58.  [Provides a record from La Marque, on the mainland portion of Galveston County, Texas, apparently the first record from the state. - TEL]

Dixon, J.R. 2013. Amphibians and reptiles of Texas. 3rd Ed. W. L. Moody, Jr., Nat. Hist. Ser. 25. College Station: Texas A&M University Press. [Includes only one literature reference for this species in Texas(Dixon, Hibbitts, and Forstner 2007), one locality (La Marque, mainland Galveston County), and a color photo of a specimen from Florida. I have reviewed this book HERE. - TEL]

Dodd, C.K. Jr. 1992. Biological diversity of a temporary pond herpetofauna in north Florida sandhills. Biodiversity and Conservation 1: 125– 142.

Dodd, C. Kenneth 2013. Frogs of the United States and Canada, 2-vol. set.  Johns Hopkins University Press. Kindle Edition.

Dundee, H.A. 1994. Geographic distribution: Eleutherodactylus planirostris (Greenhouse Frog).  Herpetol. Rev. 25: 60.  [Plaquemines Parish record - TEL]

Dundee, H.A. and D.A. Rossman. 1989. The Amphibians and Reptiles of Louisiana.  Louisiana State University Press.  300 p.  [Jefferson Parish record - TEL]

Duellman, W.E. and A. Schwartz. 1958. Amphibians and reptiles of southern Florida.  Bulletin of the Florida State Museum, Biological Sciences 3: 181-324. 

Elbers, J.B. 2007. Geographic distribution: Eleutherodactylus planirostris (Greenhouse Frog).  Herpetol. Rev. 38: 474.  [St. Tammany Parish record; speculates that this taxon may compete with Gastrophryne carolinensis as the two have been found sympatrically, much as E. cystignathoides has been found with G. olivacea in Texas  - TEL]

Enge, K.M. 1998a. Herpetofaunal survey of an upland hardwood forest in Gadsden County, Florida. Florida Scientist 61: 141– 159.

Goin, C.B. 1947. Studies on the life history of Eleutherodactylus ricordii planirostris (Cope) in Florida.  University of Florida Studies in Biological Science Series 4: 1-66.

Irwin, K.J., L. Irwin, T.W. Taggart, J.T. Collins, and S.L. Collins. 2001. An herpetofaunal survey of the Apalachicola barrier islands, Florida: the 2000– 2001 season. Kansas Herpetological Society Newsletter (123): 12– 15.

Jensen, J.B., C.D. Camp, W. Gibbons, and M.J. Elliott (eds.). 2008. Amphibians and Reptiles of Georgia. University of Georgia Press, Athens.

Kraus, F. 2009. Alien Reptiles and Amphibians. A Scientific Compendium and Analysis. Springer, Dordrecht, The Netherlands.

Kraus, F., E.W. Campbell, A. Allison, and T. Pratt. 1999. Eleutherodactylus frog introductions to Hawaii. Herpetological Review 30: 21– 25.

Lamb, Jennifer Y. and Matthew W.H. Chatfield. 2014. Geographic distribution: Eleutherodactylus planirostris (Greenhouse Frog).  Herpetol. Rev. 45(3): 458. [Jackson County, MS record, 17 mi. E of nearest previous record (Gulfport); corroborates previous unvouchered, nonspecific USGS Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database record - TEL]

Lazell, J.D., Jr. 1989. Wildlife of the Florida Keys: A Natural History.  Island Press, Covelo, California, USA.  254 pp.  [Speculates that E. planirostris may have arrived in Florida (especially the keys) naturally by wafting over from Cuba on floating debris.  Also feels that this species has been in Florida since considerably before the generally accepted date of 1863 - TEL]

Liner, E.A. 2007. Geographic distribution: Euhyas planirostris (Greenhouse Frog).  Herpetol. Rev. 38: 214.  [Terrebonne Parish record - TEL]

Mann, Debora L., Mann, Tom, Winstead, Nick, and Wenhua Lu. 2014.  Geographic distribution.  Eleutherodactylus planirostris.  Herpetol. Rev. 45(4): 652. [Hinds County, MS record: Jackson.  "Introduced species previously recorded in Mississippi from a greenhouse in Oktibbeha Co. (Starkville), about 180 km NE, and from Harrison Co. (Gulfport) (Dinsmore 2004, op. cit.), about 238 km SE. Recently also collected in Jackson Co. (Ocean Springs, Jennifer Y. Lamb, pers. comm.). The specimen captured 11 June was calling from a mound of vegetative debris in a steep, wooded ravine in the Belhaven residential neighborhood. A toe was clipped for DNA analysis. Approximately 5–6 individuals were calling concurrently nearby. One that subsequently escaped was photographed on the leaf of a shrub at the height of approximately 1 m. A brief survey for calling frogs was undertaken by car and on foot in the same neighborhood on the night of 14 June 2014. The species was heard at the collection site and at seven other sites within 1 km. MMNS 10475 was captured from the Belhaven site in the Fondren residential neighborhood when it escaped from a cat. Others were heard calling nearby; the species had previously been heard several blocks to the southwest. The presence of the frogs in multiple locations over a distance of at least 3 km suggests that the species is locally established in Jackson. To our knowledge this represents the most northerly and inland established population. The population apparently survived a cold Winter; the US National Weather Service recorded 62 days between October 2013 and April 2014 when the temperature reached 0ºC or lower in Jackson (National Weather Service, Jackson, MS Weather Forecast Office. http://www.srh. noaa.gov/jan/?n=climate_zone_jan_90_100_degs, updated 12 September2014, accessed 12 September2014). The means of introduction is not known; the Gulfport population is suspected to have arrived on nursery stock (Dinsmore 2004, op. cit.)." - TEL]

McConnell, R., T. McConnell, C. Guyer and D. Laurencio. 2015.  Geographic distribution ELEUTHERODACTUS PLANIROSTRIS (Greenhouse Frog). Herpetol. Rev. 46(4): 559. [Mobile County, Alabama record. - TEL]

Meshaka, W.E., Jr. 2008. The exotic amphibians and reptiles of the United States. In Graeter, G.J., Buhlmann, K.A., Walls, S.C., Peterson, C.R., Wilkinson, L.R. and J.W. Gibbons (Editors).  Inventory and Monitoring: Recommended Techniques for Reptiles and Amphibians, with application to the United States and Canada. PARC Technical Report.  Aiken, South Carolina.  In press.

Meshaka, W.E., Jr. 2011. A Runaway Train in the Making: The Exotic Amphibians, Reptiles, Turtles, and Crocodilians of Florida. Monograph 1. Herpetological Conservation and Biology 6:1-101. 

Meshaka, W.E., Jr., B.P. Butterfield, and J.B. Hauge. 2004.  The Exotic Amphibians and Reptiles of Florida.  Krieger, Melbourne, Florida.  166 pp.

Meshaka, W.E., Jr., Boundy, J. and A.A. Williams. 2009.  The dispersal of the Greenhouse Frog, Eleutherodactylus planirostris (Anura: Eleutherodactylidae), in Louisiana, with preliminary observations on several potential exotic colonizing species.  Journal of Kansas Herpetology 32: 13-16.  [PDF] [Observes that this species in Louisiana appears to be restricted to edificarian habitats (but see Butterfield et al. 1997) - TEL]

Meshaka, W.E., Jr. and J.N. Layne. 2005.  Habitat relationships and seasonal activity of the Greenhouse Frog (Eleutherodactylus planirostris) in southern Florida.  Florida Scientist 68: 35-43.

Platt, S.G. and L.W. Fontenot. 1995. Geographic distribution: Eleutherodactylus planirostris (Greenhouse Frog).  Herpetol. Rev. 26: 207.  [East Baton Rouge Parish record - TEL]

Plotkin, M. and R. Atkinson. 1979. Geographic distribution: Eleutherodactylus planirostris planirostris (Greenhouse Frog).  Herpetol. Rev. 10: 59.  [Orleans Parish record - TEL]

Schwartz, A. and R.W. Henderson. 1991. Amphibians and Reptiles of the West Indies: Descriptions, Distributions, and Natural History.  University of Florida Press, Gainesville, Florida.  720 pp.

Surdick, J.A. Jr. 2005. Amphibian and avian species composition of forested depressional wetlands and circumjacent habitat: the influence of land use type and intensity . Ph.D. diss., University of Florida, Gainesville.

Van Hyning, O.C. 1933. Batrachia and reptilia of Alachua County, Florida. Copeia 1933: 3– 7.

Wallace, J. Eric. 2005.  Eleutherodactylus planirostris (Cope, 1862). Greenhouse Frog. in Lannoo, Michael, ed., Amphibian Declines: the conservation status of United States species.  Berkeley: Univ. of Cal. Press, pp. 499.500. 
[Most information on this frog comes from peninsular Florida populations; comparatively little is definitely known about the specifically western-Gulf Coast populations.  Notes that Butterfield et al. (1997) documented the occurrence of these frogs in non-edificarian habitats, seemingly in contrast to what was observed by Meshaka et al. (2009) in Louisiana. - TEL]

Williams, A.A. and M.L. Wygoda. 1997.  Geographic distribution: Eleutherodactylus planirostris (Greenhouse Frog).  Herpetol. Rev. 28: 207.  [Calcasieu Parish record - TEL]

Winn, B., J.B. Jensen, and S. Johnson. 1999. Geographic distribution. Eleutherodactylus planirostris. Herpetological Review 30: 49.

Parish records from Louisiana:

Calcasieu

East Baton Rouge

Jefferson

Lafayette

Orleans

Plaquemines

St. Bernard

St. John the Baptist

St. Tammany

Terrebonne

County records from Mississippi

Harrison

Hinds

Jackson

County records from Texas

Harris 

Galveston