A new record for Brachycephalus nodoterga ( Amphibia , Anura , Brachycephalidae ) in the state of São Paulo , Brazil

The species Brachycephalus nodoterga, classified as Data Deficient by the IUCN, is recorded from a fifth known locality. Four specimens were collected north of Osasco, in the mountain range of the São Roque group, São Paulo, Brazil. A map was generated with the occurrence points of the species throughout its geographical distribution.

The genus Brachycephalus comprises 29 species of small anurans, endemic to the Atlantic Forest phytogeographical domain (Pombal and Izecksohn 2011;Frost 2015;Ribeiro et al. 2015).It is associated with leaf litter inside forests from northeastern Brazil, in the state of Bahia, to southern Brazil, in the state of Santa Catarina (Napoli et al. 2011;Pie et al. 2013;Ribeiro et al. 2015).The vast majority of its species live in high altitude areas, occurring generally above 600 m (Garey et al. 2012).
Brachycephalus was considered a monotypic genus for almost 200 years, and only in the 1990s (Pombal 1999) taxonomic rearrangements and the description of new species have resulted in a considerable increase in its diversity (Alves et al. 2006;Alves et al. 2009;Napoli et al. 2011;Ribeiro et al. 2015).A phylogenetic hypothesis for the genus was proposed recently (Clemente-Carvalho et al. 2011).Despite the growing number of studies involving the genus Brachycephalus, many species are known only from the type locality and surroundings and are often included in the category of Data Deficient (DD) in the list of endangered species of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) (Silvano et al. 2004;Garey et al. 2012).
Brachycephalus nodoterga Miranda-Ribeiro, 1920 is predominantly yellow throughout its body, with darker coloration on the back of the head, trunk and limbs, tending to greenish brown (Pombal 2010).The dorsal surface of the body is covered with dermal ossification, characterized as small protruding beads (Pombal 2010;Condez et al. 2014).It was originally described as a variety of Brachycephalus ephippium (Miranda- Ribeiro, 1920) and was treated as a full species in Heyer et al. (1990).However, the taxonomic identity of the species was questioned (Silvano et al. 2004).In a detailed review of the varieties of B. ephippium, Pombal (2010) compared the population examined by Heyer et al. (1990) from the Estação Biológica de Boracéia, in Salesópolis, state of São Paulo, with the type material of B. nodoterga from Serra da Cantareira, and confirmed the validity of the species.
Data on the natural history of B. nodoterga are nonexistent.However, similar to other species of the genus, it is presumed to present direct development (Pombal 1999).The geographical distribution is also incipient, and the occurrence of the species is only known for four localities, all in the state of São Paulo.In addition to the type locality in Serra da Cantareira, presumed to be inside of the Parque Estadual da Cantareira, cities of São Paulo and Mairiporã, there are populations of B. nodoterga in other three forest remnants: in city of Santana de Parnaíba; in the Estação Biológica de Boracéia, cities of Biritiba Mirim and Salesópolis; and in Morro do Ramalho, Parque Estadual de Ilhabela, city of Ilhabela (Figure 1 All individuals were captured in the leaf litter next to a stream in the forest.The species appears to have reproduction activity associated with the rainy season, because males were observed vocalizing sparsely during the morning and afternoon and vocalization peaks were observed in the evening.This behavior is similar to that observed for other species of the genus (Garey et al. 2012;Condez et al. 2014).
Brachycephalus nodoterga, as B. ephippium (Pie et al. 2013), is known from diverse populations (Clemente-Carvalho et al. in press) and, currently, can be considered as one of the exceptions within the genus, in which most species have restricted distribution to one or two localities (Ribeiro et al. 2015).Our record of B. nodoterga (Collecting permit SISBio 23501-6) (Figure 2), euthanized with anesthetic overdose (Lydocain 2%) and deposited in the herpetological collection of the Instituto Butantan «Alphonse Richard Hoge», São Paulo, Brazil (IBSPCR), identified with the voucher numbers of IBSPCR 1202, 1205, 1206 and 1207.
The referred specimens were identified based on morphological comparative analysis using material from scientific collections.The specimens from Osasco  In a recent national evaluation of the risk of ex tinction of the Brazilian fauna, B. nodoterga was included in the category of Data Deficient (DD) (MMA 2014).Its occurrence in the Atlantic Forest remnants from the metropolitan region of São Paulo suggests that populations may be exposed to distinct pressures, including those resulting from changes in natural environments, forest fragmentation and habitat loss.This new record reinforces the need for further studies on the biology and distribution of the species and provides data to support the evaluation of the conservation status of B. nodoterga.

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.Distribution map for Brachycephalus nodoterga with the new record in Osasco (triangle), state of São Paulo, Brazil.Other symbols represent the literature records.