CECOAL   02625
CENTRO DE ECOLOGIA APLICADA DEL LITORAL
Unidad Ejecutora - UE
artículos
Título:
Melanophryniscus cupreuscapularis (NCN). Diet.
Autor/es:
DURÉ, MARTA I.; KEHR, ARTURO I.
Revista:
HERPETOLOGICAL REVIEW
Editorial:
Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles
Referencias:
Lugar: Connecticud, USA; Año: 2006 vol. 37 p. 338 - 339
ISSN:
0018-084X
Resumen:
MELANOPHRYNISCUS CUPREUSCAPULARIS (NCN). DIET. Melanophryniscus cupreuscapularis was found alone in the surrounding areas of the type locality, in northeastern Corrientes, Argentina (Frost 2004. database at http://research.amnh.org/herpetology/amphibia/index.html).  It exploits principally terrestrial habitats, though during the reproduction season it was found also in little temporary pool  in groups of up to 10 individuals, hidden in the vegetation or floating in the surface of the water while emitted the reproductive vocalization.Up to the moment, studies detailed on the trophic ecology of this specie were not realized.   Twenty individuals were collected 15 km northwest of Corrientes (27º28’S, 58º50’W), Corrientes, Argentina, between July 1997 to April 1999. The 66,66%  (N= 12) of analyzed individuals showed identifiable stomach content (female: 22.08 ± 1.81 mm SVL, N= 5;  males: 21.82 ± 0.76 mm SVL, N= 7). Nine prey category were identified; the ants were the predominant prey both in number (66.16%) and in volume (85,77%). Nevertheless, the Coleoptera item was found by highest frequency in the stomach content of M. cupreuscapularis. Another prey of numerical importance were the mites. Table 1 summarizes data obtained by analysis of the stomach content. The values of diversity (Shannon Index, using natural logarithm) and niche amplitude (Levins index) for this species were 1.15 and 2.13  respectively. We use a non parametric test (Sperman Rank Correlations) for the analysis of the morphological measurements and diet correlations. We observed a positive and significant correlation between the snout-vent length  and mouth width of the frogs (rs= 0.68; p= 0.015). Besides, the number of ingested preys was significant correlated with predator snout-vent length  (rs= 0.76, p= 0.004).  Nevertheless the mouth width was not correlated with  volume of  preys (rs=0.063, p= 0.84). According to the types of ingested preys and the proportions in which these appeared in the diet, we think that this species possesses a generalist diet with a marked preference to the ants and it would behave as an active foraging.  The low values of diversity and amplitude of trophic niche would reveal a trend to the preferential consumption of a kind of prey, in this case the ants. Submitted by MARTA I. DURÉ and  ARTURO I. KEHR. Centro de Ecología Aplicada del Litoral (CECOAL-CONICET), C.C. 291, (3400) Corrientes, Argentina. E-mail: martadure@yahoo.com. Submitted by MARTA I. DURÉ and  ARTURO I. KEHR. Centro de Ecología Aplicada del Litoral (CECOAL-CONICET), C.C. 291, (3400) Corrientes, Argentina. E-mail: martadure@yahoo.com.