A new species of Amolops (Anura: Ranidae) from Vu Quang National Park-an ASEAN Heritage Park of Vietnam.

A new species of Amolops is described from Vu Quang National Park, Ha Tinh Province, North-central Vietnam based on morphological and molecular differences. Morphologically, Amolops minhleisp. nov. is distinguishable from its congeners by a combination of the following morphological characteristics: SVL 31.8-35.8 mm in males, 36.7-45.8 mm in females; head longer than wide; vomerine teeth absent; snout long (SE/SVL 0.16-0.17 in males, 0.16 in females); tympanum distinct, round (TD/ED 0.41-0.42 in males, 0.40-0.43 in females); skin smooth; supratympanic fold indistinct; dorsolateral fold present; webbing formula I0-0II0-1/2III0-1/2IV1/2-0V; dorsum olive green or reddish brown with a few dark spots; a brown dorsolateral stripe extending from behind eye to above vent; dorsal surface of fore- and hind-limbs light grey with brown crossbars, throat, chest and belly white; males with external vocal sac and nuptial pad on finger I; and flanks grey brown with small white glandular spot. In phylogenetic analyses, the new species is strongly supported as a member of the A. monticola group. However, the new species differs from other members of the A. monticola group by 10.00-19.66% pairwise genetic divergence in the mitochondrial ND2 gene fragment and 1.56-6.67% in the mitochondrial 16S gene fragment.