154 Frogs of the Okefinokee Swamp 



have heads 3.5 in the length while obviously her 4 to 4.5 times in the body 

 refers to Cope's method of measurement. Some of B. ayyiericanus according 

 to Cope's method would be 4 in the body, but if measured to the tympanum 

 would be 3.5 in the length. Or a Texan B. woodhousei with head 4.6 in the 

 length by cranial crests test would be 3.5 by the tympanic rule, quite far 

 moved from "head five times in total length." The double file noted in the 

 egg strings of the European Bufo vulgaris, has been urged as distinctive of B. 

 fowleri while B. americanus never has such an arrangement. Rarely, B. 

 americanus eggs are in the double file and certainly B. americanus can and 

 does breed from April 20-August. The author has seen the eggs of Bufo 

 fowleri in two instances only and in each case they were more or less a double file. 



"At the present, most beginners and some experts, some of which are with- 

 holding judgment, are unable to determine whether B. fowleri is distinct 

 enough to be considered a separate species whether it exists as a distinct form 

 at all or whether it needs an even finer refinement of descriptive characteristics. 

 At present the authors withhold judgment and merely show some of the 

 difficulties. B. americanus and B. lentiginosus seem quite distinct. Of B. 

 fowleri we say it probably exists as a separate form but needs description with 

 an abundant comparative series from Ontario to Texas, from which regions 

 our series has been taken but not in sufficient numbers to warrant a decision." 



The foregoing paragraphs were written in 1913 but today the author is not 

 yet ready to speak any ill-considered conclusions on the Bufo americanus- 

 fowleri-terrestris-woodhousii complex. I have not worked on the life history 

 of B. woodhousii, have seen eggs of Bufo fowleri but four times and need more 

 personal experience with these two species. In its egg characters Bufo 

 terrestris has two jelly tubes like B. americanus but like Bufo fowleri may have 

 no partitions between the eggs. We have tadpoles of Bufo americanus, Bufo 

 terrestris and Bufo fowleri but feel hesitant to venture opinions on their degree 

 of relationship. On superficial morphological characters, in some respects, 

 Bufo terrestris appears as much related to Bufo fowleri as Bufo americanus. 



Holbrook (1842, Vol. V, p. 10) reviews its history to 1842. We give his 

 "General Remarks. Catesby first described and gave a figure of this animal 

 under the name of Land-frog; and although his figure is badly executed, both 

 as to drawing and colouring (the elevation of the superciliary ridges not being 

 marked, and the eyes represented as red) , it has been repeatedly copied by later 

 naturalists, as Foster, Shaw, etc. The name, however, Rana (Bufo) terrestris, 

 cannot be retained, as it is previously applied to another animal. 



"Bosc, who from a long residence in Carolina, had a good opportunity of 

 examining this animal, refers it to the Rana musica of Linnaeus, in which he 

 is followed by Daudin, Merrem, and most naturalists. This cannot be correct, 

 for there are no toads, as far as has been hitherto ascertained, common to 

 North and South America; and Linnaeus, in the twelfth edition of the Systema 

 Naturae, gives Surinam, as the country of his Rana musica. Neither the 

 specific name, terrestris, nor musicus can then be applied to this animal, but 

 we must give it the one next in order under which it is found described — 

 Rana (bufo) lentiginosa of Shaw." 



