Talk:Rana (genus)

Rana re-arranged
Recent studies have placed a number of North American Rana species into an older genus. Frogs from Middle & South America were also affected, however I do not have much information on those species. Of course, there is no general consensus concering the change, but I thought I would note it. Here are the changes for North America:

note: The Ramsey Canyon Leopard Frog is apparently not officially recognized as a species yet.
 * Crawfish frog (Rana areolata to Lithobates areolatus)
 * Rio Grande Leopard Frog (R. berlandieri to Lithobates berlandieri)
 * Plains Leopard Frog (R. blairi to Lithobates blairi)
 * Carolina Gopher Frog (R. capito to Lithobates capito)
 * Bullfrog (R. catesbeiana to Lithobates catesbeianus)
 * Chiricahua Leopard Frog (R. chiricahuensis to Lithobates chiricahuensis)
 * Green Frog (R. clamitans to Lithobates clamitans)
 * Pig Frog (R. grylio to Lithobates grylio)
 * River Frog (R. heckscheri to Lithobates heckscheri)
 * Florida Bog Frog (R. okaloosae to Lithobates okaloosae)
 * Relict Leopard Frog (R. onca to Lithobates onca)
 * Pickerel Frog (R. palustris to Lithobates palustris)
 * Northern Leopared Frog (R. pipiens to Lithobates pipiens)
 * Mink Frog (R. septentrionalis to Lithobates septentrionalis)
 * Dusky Gopher Frog (R. sevosa to Lithobates sevosus)
 * Florida Leopard Frog (R. sphenocephala to Lithobates sphenocephalus)
 * Ramsey Canyon Leopard Frog (R. subaquavocalis to Lithobates subaquavocalis)
 * Wood Frog (R. sylvatica to Lithobates sylvaticus)
 * Tarahumara Frog (R. tarahumarae to Lithobates tarahumarae)
 * Carpenter Frog (R. virgatipes to Lithobates virgatipes)
 * Lowland Leopard Frog (R. yavapaiensis to Lithobates yavapaiensis)

Here is a link for those interested : http://www.cnah.org/research.asp?id=52 MFuture 23:37, 30 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Very true, I'm currently busy with the genus Lithobates and its species. Here another link: http://research.amnh.org/herpetology/amphibia/references.php?g_id=959 . Peter Maas\talk 17:52, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I've moved the Lithobates species mentioned in to the new genus. Also changed the species pages. Peter Maas\talk 19:48, 10 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Here are a couple of references for moving them back to Rana:


 * 🇦🇹 (2005): Phylogeny of the New World true frogs (Rana). Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 34(2): 299–314. PDF fulltext.
 * 🇦🇹 (2007) Constraints in naming parts of the Tree of Life. Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 42: 331–338.

Lithobates is actually defined as a much more restrictive taxon, equivalent to the Rana palmipes group. It is now treated as a subgenus of Rana, but only for four species, including none of the North American species. Ranapipiens (talk) 23:25, 10 March 2008 (UTC)Ranapipiens


 * Note I have changed a word in the Lithobates article - Hillis could not undo the decision of Frost (only the ICZN can delete taxa), but he could (and did) reject this. And wisely so I say - I have not looked at the matter in detail - if sufficiently detailed studies exist at all -, but judging from Cai et al. (2007), I would rather not split off even Hydrophylax, Hylarana and Odorrana. It might be an artefact of taxon sampling that resolves itself if many other taxa of the clade are included, but their study does not robustly separate Babina, Hydrophylax, Hylarana, Lithobates, Odorrana and Rana sensu stricissimo. Subgenera yes - to be delimited as time goes by -, but when it comes to genus level, these all fall together as a very strongly recognizable clade with weak internal structure.
 * So stay tuned for some revisor doing some merging back into Rana in the future... for the time being, I have listed them as separate on the True frog page, which (hopefully) is now a good working basis. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 18:21, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Also, there are a lot of Hylarana etc species articles which still retain the old genus Rana. The Category:Rana holds the whole lot. Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 18:31, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

format of page
I think that the format of the list of species in this article should follow that of Litoria and that of most Australian frog articles. Ie. Common Name, Scientific Name (authority, year) rather than Scientific Name Authority, year and common name (if available) It is also better to have the link to the common name rather than the scientific name to follow WP:TOL. I realise that this is a big change so if no one objects to this format over the next couple days I will start chaging the page, by adding all the common names and linking them. I will also start moving individual frog articles from scientific name to common name where one is available.--Tnarg1 2 3 4  5 08:55, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree. I am the one who changed most of the Australian frog articles. It takes quite a long time on articles like this one. ANHM is the best source for common names (though be wary, as some of them are pretty obscure!). --liquidGhoul 09:43, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
 * A suggestion, don't move articles but make redirects. Froggydarb 09:03, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
 * No, they need to be moved if there is a suitable common name. Redirect from the scientific name, name the article in the common name. --liquidGhoul 10:55, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm going to start moving some pages today, will be using full caps instead of partial caps.--Tnarg1 2 3 4  5 02:17, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

All articles have been moved except Green frog as there is already an atricle "Green Frog", which is just a redirect to Green frog, so it won't let me move the page. I will start re-formatting the page today or tomorrow. I am not sure whether to have the authority in brackets or not, as an authority inside brackets means a different thing to an authority not in brackets, does anyone have an opinion on this?--Tnarg1 2 3 4  5 09:23, 9 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Common Name, Scientific Name (authority, year) is confusing to look at, because the "field" by which the list is ordered doesn't come first. Is Scientific Name Authority, year and common name (if available) really that bad? Ardric47 20:39, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
 * The main reason for having the common name first is because it is the name of the article and the name of the frog. I understand what you mean by the order of the list, but I think that people will still understand the order of the list, even though scientific doesn't come first.--Tnarg1 2 3 4  5 07:50, 30 July 2006 (UTC)


 * From my personal experience with loads of taxa:
 * If there are no standardized common names for all species, scientific name has to go first. That basically applies to every taxon except birds and to some extent mammals. May seem harsh, but Litoria moorei shows why it cannot work otherwise.
 * The author/date MUST NOT use parentheses except when they are necessary. This is not a style thing, there is ONE AND ONLY ONE way to write this information and all others ARE WRONG just as giving the scientific name of the Edible Frog as unitalicized "Rana Esculentus" is wrong. (Though not as grossly - "Rana Esculentus" contains 5 taxonomic errors. Can you find them all?)
 * I usually move author/date information to the taxobox. For one thing, the taxobox has a section for this. For another thing, I have not found a sizeable list of amphibians (which are extensively present at species level due to the IUCN checking on their redlist status and Polbot creating the articles) - say 3 dozen taxa or more - where there was not at least one probable or certain error. It is a maintenance nightmare. So I only keep the author/date info when the taxon has no article yet. It also makes layouting easier, as taxon authors may not be abbreviated with et al. and the lists are thus sometimes extremely long. This is not a trivial thing. From my experience I'd estimate that apart from Polbot scripting errors, >90% of FALSE taxonomic information on Wikipedia is due to redundant author/date listing. If we have one place (taxobox) for author/date information, any conflicts can be resolved in this single place and are not strewn about across many articles. (This is particularly bad in amphibians, for whatever reason. Probably because they are such a diverse and popular group but until recently no single good taxonomic source like Fishbase, MotW or Clements/H&M checklists existed) Dysmorodrepanis (talk) 18:14, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Unclear Systematics intro
The first paragraph of the Systematics section is confusing: "Rana is now restricted to the Old World true frogs and the Eurasian brown and pond frogs of the common frog R. temporaria group". This is simply false as there are still several valid Rana species in Western North America (R. aurora, R. draytonii, R. muscosa, etc.), and confusing because it seems to conflate generic and subgeneric names in the same sentence. If the discussion is about the subgeneric names Rana and Lithobates, then it should be unambiguously stated as such. The subgenera and synonyms in the Taxobox are likewise vague and unhelpful. Animalparty (talk) 09:16, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

Taxonomy Updated
The taxonomy and literature discussion was out of date. The most recent systematic revision of the group, which includes Rana systematists from across Europe, Asia, and North America (including the authors who previously recognized Lithobates as a distinct genus) is now cited and followed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by HerpSystematics (talk • contribs) 17:15, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Since you're evidently new to WP, I'll fill you in - WP does not change every time a new taxonomy is published, as it would leave the articles a total mess. Instead, we use standardized online taxonomic databases, curated by experts in the field, as outlined here: WikiProject_Amphibians_and_Reptiles.  This was determined to provide the ideal mix of stability and accuracy.  If you wish to object to the current database, please do so on the main project page.  If you want a new paper added, please consult the maintainers of the databases listed, as WP cannot do that.  Otherwise, be patient.  If the taxonomic change is valid, it will be accepted over the next several years and added to WP in due time. HCA (talk) 18:39, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Actually, as an author of this page, and a participant in the mediated discussion of this page, I think the revisions by HerpSystematics are exactly in line with the agreed upon solution. This page never should have been reverted to the old taxonomy; it was very confusing and conflicted in many places. HerpSystematics has brought it up to date. The Yuan et al. (2016) paper represents a clear consensus among the many experts on this groups, including many who previously used a different taxonomy. It makes no sense to delete these many improvements without any citation to a paper that refutes the international consensus on the group.Ranapipiens (talk) 19:33, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * You're just using HerpSystematics' edits as an excuse to evade the results of the Mediation, and I've filed on the Administrator's Noticeboard about this. The conclusion was to use the AMNH database for taxonomy.  If Yuan et al is so great, then I'm sure it will be accepted into the database.  We use the databases for a reason - because we can't go off re-naming pages every time a new paper comes out.  Hell, do you want the snake taxonomy on WP to have to keep pace with freaking Hoser, of all people?  No.  So we use databases, and you failed to make a good case for your views.  I will not re-fight the same argument every time a paper comes out.  You agreed to mediation, just like we did, so have the honor to stick with the outcome. HCA (talk) 19:39, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * That is a completely baseless and false accusation. The decision of our extensive Mediation was that ALL relevant literature on the subject would be cited, and that we would continue to update the pages as new information was published. There was NEVER any decision in the Mediation to use the AMNH online list; if you disagree, show me where that was agreed upon! Frankly, HerpSystematics did everyone a favor with his/her edits, which bring the pages up to date, and accurately discuss all the relevant literature, which WAS the final resolution of Mediation.Ranapipiens (talk) 20:16, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Show me how "cite" or "dicsuss" is the same as "unilaterally re-write the whole page". HCA (talk) 20:27, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I retained all the information from the previous page, including the old citations, and simply updated the page with the latest consensus taxonomy and citations on the group. I did not remove any citations to the old literature, but rather updated the page with the latest paper on the group. I can't see any reason why you would not support these changes, and you haven't cited any papers that refute the Yuan et al. (2016) consensus taxonomy paper. It seems that we should all be celebrating that all these authors from so many countries got together and reached a consensus among their previously disparate positions, finally giving some closure to this largely senseless debate.HerpSystematics (talk) 20:34, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * What consensus? Pretty sure I didn't see Frost's name on that author list.  Maybe a few folks "switched sides" or joined one, but without the major voice of the other side, that's hardly "consensus".  How do I know I won't see a rebuttal in a few months, like in 2009? HCA (talk) 20:43, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * First up I was also a part of the mediation on these pages and 's view of what went on there was accurate. Second when Yuan et al's paper has had time to be absorbed into the literature maybe then it can be followed, if that is what the international amphibian biologists eventually agree to follow. Until then it is too soon to blindly follow it and the WP page should continue to follow what has been consensus. Amphibian taxonomy is now and has been for some time a highly contentious issue, it will be a better service to the WP users that it has some stability through this. Where to apply the names in a tree is entirely subjective and open to interpretation, it always has been. Being too quick to follow the latest paper is what causes many of these issues. Therefore the accepted consensus should remain in place until a clear change has been accepted. Please remove the changes from Lithobates that sinks it to subgenus, taxonomic changes require prevailing usage and the prevailing usage is that it is a genus. Cheers Faendalimas  talk 22:33, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * The ArbCom resolution was to present a balanced view of all the published papers. That is what the revised page accomplished. The reversion to an old version does NOT do that. Frost has not published anything, one way or the other, on this group of frogs since 2009, and he is now retired. When he last did publish a viewpoint it was merely that he supported his view because Che et al. (2007) had recognized Lithobates and Pseudorana as genera. Obviously, that has now changed, and Frost has published nothing in the past seven years to support the recognition of Lithobates. All I did was update the page to reflect the recent publications on the group, which was supported by both sides of the previous controversy. The new published data are overwhelming in comparison to anything presented before; data collection and analysis has come a long way since 2006. By reverting the page, you are ignoring the ArbCom resolution as well as the latest literature on the group. Has anyone provided recent support for the recognition of Lithobates? No. Have all the major systemtists who work on the group supported the recognition of the broader genus Rana? Yes. If you want to support the outdated taxonomy, provide a rebuttal to the current literature.HerpSystematics (talk) 02:14, 7 July 2016 (UTC)


 * HS, you clearly simply refuse to listen. We have explained time and time again how WP works, why it works the way it does, and the proper channels for suggesting changes.  Until you can demonstrate some understanding of that, there's no point listening to you, since you're clearly not listening to anyone else.  Explain, in your own words, what WP:OS, WP:Secondary, and WP:Consensus mean, 10 points each.  Partial credit will be given. HCA (talk) 15:12, 7 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I think you have treated HS extremely unfairly. S/he simply updated the page to reflect the current literature, and in the process, fixed many errors and problems in the page. By reverting to the Frost (2006) taxonomy, and ignoring the other more recent literature (including refusing to even cite the most recent major systematic revision of the group), you are clearly violating the earlier ArbCom agreement, in which it was agreed that this page would fairly present all sides and cite all the relevant literature. Since you insist on presenting Frost's classification, I will attempt to leave that classification in the page, and add the new information presented by HerpSystematics as an alternative. Given that this is clearly a major revision, favored by most of the active Rana systematists in the world, it should at least be presented as an alternative to the outdated Frost classifcation.Ranapipiens (talk) 19:22, 7 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I've now made the modifications noted above, and left Frost's classification as it was, and added in the new Yuan et al. (2016) classification as contributed by HerpSystematics for contrast. Now people can compare the two classifications, learn about the differences, and make a decision for themselves. Given that the Yuan et al. (2016) classification has been adopted by most of the active workers in this group (from across the globe), it certainly should be presented as an alternative to the Frost (2006) classification. I thank HerpSystematics for your excellent work on this page, and I hope that this rough experience has not completely scared you away from WP.Ranapipiens (talk) 19:31, 7 July 2016 (UTC)


 * You see this is where you do not get consensus. Your first post would be fine, but you did not wait and give anyone a chance to comment before you did it. That is not consensus. That is what you have always done and what HCA was referring to when he tried to point out these issues to HS. That said I do not have a major issue with what you have done, with the exception that Lithobates should not be listed as a subgenus in the taxobox, in text mention it but not the taxobox not yet. One of the issues I have had with your edits over time Ranapipiens is that you where trying to use information from this Yuan et al paper last year during the ArbCom, ie before it was submitted. This leads me to believe you fail to have a NPOV and hence should be very careful in editing this page. You have also repeatedly claimed that all Rana biologists agree with you, well last year when you made this claim I decided to ask as many as I knew and although I admit my survey was not complete by any means the impression I got was that you did not have that level of support. In fact many were sick to death of the Rana debate and believed it was just a bunch of North Americans who could not cope with a name change, their words not mine. I am not saying you do not have the potential for good input, but the way you do it is not acceptable on WP. I suggest you remove Lithobates from the subgenus list in the taxobox, I am not going to revert this but do not be surprised if it is. The reason is that you have still failed to even attempt to get a consensus. This type of editing is not welcome by you or HS. I also found it interesting that HS created their account and started editing Rana pages the moment the Yuan et al paper came out. I have evebn considered a CU being done on this. Cheers Faendalimas  talk 20:23, 7 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I strongly agree, and I will make it explicit - I think both RP and HS have COI, and unless both are prepared to guarantee that they are neither authors on the Yuan et al 2016 nor Hillis et al 2009 papers, nor students of any of those authors, I suggest we make a formal COI complaint to ArbCom. HCA (talk) 21:45, 7 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Now I think you are just being difficult on purpose. We have been through the COI thing before, and it is simply inappropriate to keep bringing it back up. I don't know who HS is; s/he can speak for him/herself. But the changes s/he made were absolutely correct and up to date, and in the spirit of our ArbCom resolution. If you wanted to delete the subgenera from the Taxbox, you could have just done that, rather than reverting the whole article once again. I'll be happy to delete those subgenera from that box, per your request. But obviously the current literature needs to be cited, and the Yuan et al. paper is the most comprehensive systematic review/revision of the group ever published. The version you reverted to has numerous errors, beyond just the incomplete literature and the taxonomy. Please, if you want to edit the page, respect all this work, and make your edits to the page, but don't revert to a version that as badly out of date.Ranapipiens (talk) 21:55, 7 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Then answer one question. How did you have access to and permission to publicly utilize information from a paper that had not at that time been submitted? Or should I send an email to all the authors and ask them? Cheers Faendalimas  talk 05:44, 8 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Just so you know, as a professional taxonomist I have had to deal with NPOV and COI also, but the way to avoid the issues is to first of all be honest about it and second have your edits reviewed. Cheers Faendalimas  talk 05:55, 8 July 2016 (UTC)

Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard


 * The fact that all the Rana systematists across different countries were getting together for a collaborative study to resolve this problem was well known and discussed publicly in the amphibian systematics community. Several of the authors gave public presentations on the results. I did not discuss the consortium paper other than to note that it was in the works, and would have a major impact on this issue.Ranapipiens (talk) 04:47, 10 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Then you should have no problem simply answering whether you have COI or not. Yes or no? HCA (talk) 16:33, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

Rana basaltica
Rana basaltica is an extinct frog found in fossils – it has had an orphaned page for many years. As a non-frog specialist, it seems logical to me to add it to the list of species on this page. However, as this talk page has seen a lot of taxonomy discussions, I wasn't sure whether to add it. Please could anyone suggest whether it could/should be added here, or whether a list on a different page would be more appropriate? Thanks. DferDaisy (talk) 00:54, 24 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Most articles include only extant species. If extinct species were added it could clutter the article. You could start a "list article" of extinct species but it might be quite difficult to build. Dger (talk) 01:10, 24 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Actually that is not accurate. Most articles do not include fossil taxa simply due to the sources used to write the articles are not on the fossil taxa and dont mention them.  As they are members of the genus, they should be listed just like any extant species.-- Kev  min  § 12:52, 24 March 2017 (UTC)
 * I stand by what I said. Most genera articles do not include extinct species. Dger (talk) 03:14, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
 * And I maintain that the assertion that fossil species are clutter is erroneous and is not correct.-- Kev min  § 14:59, 25 March 2017 (UTC)

I advocate for inclusion. Extinct taxa are crucial to understanding extant taxa, and appear on many WP pages. Trying to understand biology without paleontology is like trying to understand today's news without knowledge of any event that happened more than a month ago. HCA (talk) 17:28, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
 * I don't disagree but if it is done it shouldn't be just one random species. All should be included. By the way a quick search showed there were several other articles on extinct Rana. Where is there a list of all of them, included or not in Wikipedia? Dger (talk) 00:48, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Here is a starting point for extinct species Fossilworks Rana entry †Rana basaltica, †Rana bucella, Rana catesbeiana, Rana dalmatina, †Rana fayeae, †Rana johnsoni, Rana macrocnemis, †Rana meriani, †Rana miocenica, †Rana parvissima, Rana pipiens, †Rana plicata, †Rana pueyoi, Rana quellembergi, †Rana rexroadensis, Rana temporaria. † indicates fossil species, the extant species in the list have described fossil records.-- Kev  min  § 01:30, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

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ASW6 vs. AmphibiaWeb
ASW6 and AmphibiaWeb give different structures for Rana. How do we reconcile the two? WP:AAR recommends following ASW6, but would it really be a good idea to move and recategorize hundreds of articles to reflect the changes in ASW6? HᴇʀᴘᴇᴛᴏGᴇɴᴇꜱɪꜱ (talk) 07:30, 1 December 2019 (UTC)