Rhyaconastes Mahony, Donnellan & Richards, 2025

Donnellan, Stephen C., Mahony, Michael J., Esquerré, Damien, Brennan, Ian G., Price, Luke C., Lemmon, Alan, Lemmon, Emily Moriarty, Günther, Rainer, Monis, Paul, Bertozzi, Terry, Keogh, J. Scott, Shea, Glenn M. & Richards, Stephen J., 2025, Phylogenomics informs a generic revision of the Australo-Papuan treefrogs (Anura: Pelodryadidae), Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 204 : -

Rhyaconastes Mahony, Donnellan & Richards , gen. nov.

( Fig. 31)

ZooBank LSID: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:82FC7DE1-19E8-4EB4-B16C-A27134640EA8

Synonymy

Euscelis Fitzinger 1843: 31 (type species lesueurii ). Unavailable as its preoccupied by Euscelis Brullé 1832: 109 .

Type species: Hyla lesueurii Duméril & Bibron 1841 .

Content: Four species— Rhyaconastes booroolongensis * ( Moore, 1961) comb. nov., Rhyaconastes jungguy * ( Donnellan & Mahony, 2004) comb. nov., Rhyaconastes lesueurii * ( Duméril & Bibron, 1841) comb. nov., Rhyaconastes wilcoxii * ( Günther, 1864) comb. nov.

Diagnosis: Rhyaconastes can be diagnosed from Melvillihyla by its medium to large vs. very large body size, cartilaginous vs. ossified intercalary structures, tadpole oral disc Type 3 vs. Type 1, and overall tadpole morphology Type 6 vs. Type 5, and multiple vs. single notes per reproductive call. Refer to Tables 1 and 2.

Distribution and ecology: Terrestrial frogs that breed in streams and rivers in forests and woodlands in eastern Australia. All species lack a vocal sac but produce a low amplitude call.

Etymology: From the Greek ῥύακος (rhyakos, a stream or torrent) and ναστής (nastes, inhabitant), alluding to the stream-breeding habits of the species in the genus. The name, based on nastes, is masculine.

68 • Donnellan et al.

Remarks: Rhyaconastes is the equivalent of the Litoria booroolongensis and L. lesueurii Groups of Tyler and Davies (1978). All Rhyaconastes species lack a vocal sac which distinguishes them from other ground-dwelling genera such as Cyclorana and Litoria .