New distribution records of Pelophylax mongolius in Gansu and Qinghai Province

In August 2021, we collected five specimens of Pelophylax (Fitzinger, 1843), in Yongjing County, Linxia Hui Autonomous Prefecture, Gansu Province, China. These specimens include one subadult specimen with a snout-vent length of 31.2 mm, three adult female specimens with snout-vent lengths ranging from 66.1 to 72.2 mm, and one adult male specimen with a snout-vent length of 62.4 mm. In June 2023, we collected additional five specimens of Pelophylax in Minhe Hui and Tu Autonomous County, Haidong City, Qinghai Province. All the specimens are adults, including one female specimen with a snout-vent length of 48.2 mm and four male specimens with snout-vent lengths ranging from 50.1 to 59.0 mm. Morphological comparison confirms that all specimens exhibit the following characteristics: a triangular head with the head length slightly greater than the head width, smooth skin, black spots on the back, a light green longitudinal line extending from the tip of snout to vent, well-developed jaw glands, round eardrums with diameter larger than eye diameter, short and stout hind limbs, blunt and rounded toe tips, and fully webbed toes without notches. The morphological characteristics of the 10 specimens were similar to those of Pelophylax mongolius (Schmidt, 1925) from Tumd Right Banner, Baotou City, Inner Mongolia (type locality of P. mongolius). Phylogenetic analysis based on concatenated gene fragments of 16S rRNA, 12S rRNA, COI and Cytb showed that the ten specimens clustered together with P. mongolius with short genetic distance (p-distance = 1.9 %). We confirm that the ten specimens represent new distribution records for P. mongolius in Gansu and Qinghai provinces.