Study On Biodiversity Of Amphibians In The Xuefeng Mountain And A Cryptic Species Of The Genus Tylototriton(Amphibia,Salamandridae)

The Xuefeng Mountain has a unique geographical location,which is rich of the original forest and water resources.The superior ecological environment can be an ideal place for wildlife to habit and reproduct.And it has important status and research significance in the protection of ecology and biodiversity.In order to learn the resource status,population dynamics,and threatened factors about amphibians,to provide management countermeasures for the work of biodiversity conservation,we have investigated the amphibians in the Xuefeng Mountain during2017 to 2018 by the line-transect method.As the investigation result,27 species of amphibians which are belonging to 2 orders,8 families and 18 genera were recorded,and they accounted for 39.71% and 6.62% of the number of amphibians in Hunan and China,respectively.In species composition,Ranidae is the dominant family,which has the most species with 9 species,accounting for 33.33%of the composition;and Microhyla is the dominant genus with 4 species,accounting for 14.81% of the composition.In both years,the largest number of amphibious individuals was recorded in April,accounting for22.81% and 21.08%,respectively.Fejervarya multistriata is the most in number,accounting for 38.53% of all the species.The Hoplobatrachusrugulosus was be a second-grade State protected species,and eight Chinese endemic species was be observed.Besides,the Megophrys tuberogrannulus was recorded for the first time in the Xuefeng Mountains.The Shannon-Wiener index and Simpson index of the amphibians in the Xuefeng Mountain were 2.0088 and 0.7849,and the Pielou index was0.6241.In the fauna,there were 21 species as the oriental realm,accounting for 77.78%.The Rana quadranus both distributed in central region and southwest region,and 7 species were distributed in all of the oriental realm.The Sorenson index between the Xuefeng Mountain with other 11 regions in Hunan was for 0.58% to 0.71%.There were eight main human disturbances recorded in the Xuefeng Mountain including farming,grazing,collection,domestic garbage,road construction,capture,artificial channels,and wind power generation.All the lines showed the general trend of "the more interference,the lower Shannon-Wiener index".Due to the long-term field investigations,a tailed amphibian population belong to Tylototriton which was collected in Huangyan area of Xuefeng Mountain.The species is able to distinguish from other species in this genus according to morphological,bone specimen and molecular biological data,and was named Tylototriton huangyanensis sp.nov..The diagnostic characteristics of the new species are as follows: thefront of the basihyal cartilage is reasonably smooth without branch;the row of vomerine teeth form a "?" shape and only extend to the middle of the orbit,rather than the bottom;tubercles of the middle dorsal ridge are reasonably clear and numerable,the range is 12-18;the head length exceeds the head width,and the aspect ratio is different to that of other species(P < 0.001);the fronto-squamosal arch is weak but protrude noticeably to the back,and eyelids can be observed from the top-view;behind the lateral side of squamosal,an obvious columnar protuberance formed,which extends to the base of the forelimb;the width of tail base is extremely significantly smaller than the tail height(P < 0.001),approximately equal to the interorbital space,and lower than other species of the same family(P < 0.001).