''Buergeria'' is a genus of

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely Carnivore, carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order (biology), order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-f ...

s in the family

Rhacophoridae The Rhacophoridae are a family of frogs that occur in tropical sub-Saharan Africa, South India and Sri Lanka, Japan, northeastern India to eastern China and Taiwan, south through the Philippines and Greater Sundas, and Sulawesi. They are commonly ...

, and the sole genus of subfamily Buergeriinae. They are the

sister taxon In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and t ...

for all the other rhacophorids (subfamily

Rhacophorinae The Rhacophorinae are a subfamily of frogs in the family Rhacophoridae. They range from tropical Africa and Asia to temperate China and Japan. Genera The following genera are recognised in the subfamily Rhacophorinae, representing 422 species: * ...

). This position is firmly supported by the available evidence. ''Buergeria'' are sometimes known as Buerger's frogs. There are four species found in an area that stretches from

Hainan Hainan (, ; ) is the smallest and southernmost province of the People's Republic of China (PRC), consisting of various islands in the South China Sea. , the largest and most populous island in China,The island of Taiwan, which is slightly l ...

(China) and

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

through the

Ryukyu Islands The , also known as the or the , are a chain of Japanese islands that stretch southwest from Kyushu to Taiwan: the Ōsumi, Tokara, Amami, Okinawa, and Sakishima Islands (further divided into the Miyako and Yaeyama Islands), with Yonaguni ...

Honshu , historically called , is the largest and most populous island of Japan. It is located south of Hokkaidō across the Tsugaru Strait, north of Shikoku across the Inland Sea, and northeast of Kyūshū across the Kanmon Straits. The island separ ...

(

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

Description

''Buergeria'' are medium-sized to large frogs (snout-vent length ) that resemble in their body form ''

Rana Rana may refer to: Astronomy * Rana (crater), a crater on Mars * Delta Eridani or Rana, a star People, groups and titles * Rana (name), a given name and surname (including a list of people and characters with the name) * Rana (title), a histori ...

'' (unlike other rhacophorids). Their skin is smooth and they have no dorsal ornamentations. Their feet are fully webbed whereas their fingers are only up to half-webbed. They produce many eggs that are deposited in water and develop through a

tadpole A tadpole is the larval stage in the biological life cycle of an amphibian. Most tadpoles are fully aquatic, though some species of amphibians have tadpoles that are terrestrial. Tadpoles have some fish-like features that may not be found i ...

stage.

Species

There are six recognized species in the genus ''Buergeria'': * '' Buergeria buergeri'' (Temminck & Schlegel, 1838) — Kajika Frog * '' Buergeria choui'' Matsui & Tominaga, 2020 * '' Buergeria japonica'' (Hallowell, 1861) — Ryukyu Kajika Frog * '' Buergeria otai'' Wang, Hsiao, Lee, Tseng, Lin, Komaki & Lin, 2018 * '' Buergeria oxycephala'' (Boulenger, 1900) * '' Buergeria robusta'' (Boulenger, 1909)

Conservation

The

International Union for Conservation of Nature The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natu ...

(IUCN) has assessed one of the four species as being vulnerable ('' Buergeria oxycephala''), while the remaining ones are considered being of

least concern A least-concern species is a species that has been categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as evaluated as not being a focus of species conservation because the specific species is still plentiful in the wild. T ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q2705232 Amphibian genera Frogs of Asia Taxa named by Johann Jakob von Tschudi Taxonomy articles created by Polbot