Hyla cinerea 255 



and a third purplish brown. One captured by H. H. Knight had quite a 

 purpHsh area from nostril to femur. Some of the Hyla cinerea have a narrow 

 purplish line above and below the white, cream colored, or straw colored 

 lateral band. Is this the cradle of Southeastern tree frogs? There were un- 

 spotted H. evittata, Hyla squirella, H. cinerea, olive or green or possibly 

 brownish with or without lateral bands, with or without dark borders to band, 

 also specimens very suggestive of how Hyla andersonii form might possibly be 

 derived." Alas this most interesting series, one the of largest we ever collected, 

 dried up and was lost before we ever studied it critically. Only 14 clear Hyla 

 cinerea of this series remain. The interesting .specimens are lost. 



In 1922 on our way to Okefinokee Swamp we heard from our camp on the 

 Alexandria (Henshaw Sparrow station) heights what the writer took to be 

 Hyla cinerea. I suspected they were Hyla evittata and Mr. Harper recognized 

 them as such from his previous collection of them. They impressed me as 

 Hyla cinerea in call and the author has always inclined to the belief that Hyla 

 evittata is Hyla cinerea but it is not yet settled. To call it Hyla cinerea evittata 

 as Dunn (19 18, p. 21) and Stejneger and Barbour (1923, p. 30) have is about 

 all that we can do until the life history is worked out by some one who knows 

 Hyla cinerea intimately. These forms from Virginia northward tend to 

 predominate in evittata coloration; those from North Carolina southward to 

 Texas are regularly striped with occasional evittata forms. 



The lateral stripe present or absent is not in the southern forms a sex char- 

 acter. In our 192 1 material three of our records are of females 57 mm., 

 55 mm., and 56 mm. in length and two males 58 mm. and 55 mm. All these 

 five have a jaw stripe. In a male and a female the lateral stripe is missing on 

 each side. In one specimen, male, the stripe is present on one side and missing 

 on the other side. In one female lateral stripe missing on one side. On this 

 side jaw stripe only 7 mm. long from beneath eye to angle of mouth. On the 

 opposite side the lateral stripe is just a httle beyond shoulder. In the 

 other female no stripe on one side and hardly none of the other side. 



The head characters are supposed to be diagnostic but broader noses and 

 deeper faces occur with the narrow noses, nearer nostrils and shallow faces. 

 We have before us an evittata female with deep face, wider separated nostrils, 

 broader, blunter nose and a male of the same length vittate, pointed nose, 

 shallow face and nostrils nearer together. At transformation the stripe may 

 sometimes be absent; in fact at times it may be more absent than present. 



General habits. In 1842 (Vol. IV, p. 121) Holbrook remarked that "At 

 certain seasons they may be seen on the ground on their way to pools of water; 

 they are exceedingly active, leaping at times eight to ten feet." 



"The Green Tree Frog is most interesting when kept in captivity. It lives 

 high among the ferns and vines of its moss-garden, and is especially fond of 

 flies. It will see a fly at a distance of three or four feet, and will catch it, 

 making but one leap over the intervening distance. It is said that this tree 

 frog can leap a distance of eight to ten feet. When the call is given, the throat 

 pouch is inflated and the body over the lungs swells and relaxes forcibly." 

 (Dickerson 1906, p. 127). 



