Limnodynastes
Limnodynastes is a genus of frog native to Australia, southern New Guinea and some Torres Strait Islands. They are ground-dwelling frogs, with no toe pads. The size varies from 45 mm to 90 mm in the giant banjo frog. The webbing on the feet ranges between species, from very little, to almost complete. The tympanum is not visible in any species, except in the woodworker frog, which is sometimes classed in a separate genus Megistolotis. All species construct a foam nest in which the eggs are laid. However, in south-eastern South Australia female striped marsh frog and spotted grass frog lack the flanges of skin on the hands that helps trap the air bubble and do not construct foam nests.

LiquidGhoul at English Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.
On record
Recorded, not inferred- Sits inside
- LeptodactylidaePBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Life habit
- amphibiousPBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Environment
- brackish,freshwater,terrestrialPBDB, for Tetrapoda
Time the record covers
At least 22 million years on record.
The record covers at least 23.04 Mya to 129 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 27.3 Mya to 11.7 ka.
5 occurrences of Limnodynastes on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.
When
5 occurrences- Oligocene20%
- Miocene20%
- Pleistocene60%
These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.
Found in
1 formation
Loading coastlines…
The named rock units Limnodynastes has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 4 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Limnodynastes and its relatives
PleistoceneWhere Limnodynastes and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.
Found in the same rock
141 taxa- Bettongia lesueur2 sites
- Cercartetus nanus2 sites
- Conilurus2 sites
- Corvus2 sites
- Dasyurus viverrinus2 sites
- Hirundo neoxena2 sites
- Isoodon obesulus2 sites
- Lagorchestes2 sites
- Litoria2 sites
- Litoria ewingi2 sites
- Macropus rufogriseus2 sites
- Mastacomys2 sites
- Notomys2 sites
- Petaurus breviceps2 sites
- Potorous platyops2 sites
- Pseudocheirus peregrinus2 sites
- Pseudomys2 sites
- Ranidella signifera2 sites
- Rattus2 sites
- Sthenurus andersoni2 sites
- Thylacinus cynocephalus2 sites
- Tiliqua2 sites
- Tribonyx mortierii2 sites
- Trichosurus vulpecula2 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 4 sites for Limnodynastes, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.
This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.
Entered from
4 references- Pleistocene frogs from caves at Naracoorte, South Australia2
- Pleistocene fossil vertebrate sites of the South East region of South Australia II1
- Fossil mammals of Riversleigh, northwestern Queensland; preliminary overview of biostratigraphy, correlation and environmental change1
- Tertiary frogs from South Australia1
Each of the 5 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content2
Picture of Limnodynastes
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- LiquidGhoul at English Wikipedia
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
CT scan
- Source
- MorphoSource
- Licence
- not stated by the source
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
- Specimen
- Limnodynastes sp. · 5U2P2-414
Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.
Keep going
What may have been alongside itLeptodactylidae through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Fitzinger 1843