Croaking for haste: How long does it take to describe a frog species since its discovery?

Abstract

Global biodiversity faces severe anthropogenic threats, with alarming extinction rates projected for the near future. Most of Earth’s diversity remains undescribed, meaning countless species are doomed to extinction before being documented. Since current conservation laws typically consider only described species, the lag time in achieving a representative global biodiversity inventory is a crucial issue impeding effective conservation. Amphibians, the most endangered vertebrate class, exemplify the challenge: while the number of threatened species rises, new species descriptions rapidly increase, and hundreds of candidate species are flagged annually. We analyzed all anuran species described from 2000 to 2023 across four biodiversity-rich tropical regions to investigate the time required to describe new frog species. We quantified the time needed to collect the type series, the number and timing of expeditions, the lag between collection and publication, and the total time. Additionally, we explored temporal trends and the effect of selected abiotic variables. The time-lag from the collection of the first specimen to the formal publication of a frog species description ranged from 0.4 to 125.7 years (median = 7.3, mean = 11.3), type series collection from 0 to 104.9 (median = 0.1, mean = 4.5), and description and publication from 0.2 to 54.6 (median = 4.4, mean = 6.8). Alarmingly, the time required to describe new species is globally increasing. Thirty-six percent of species were named within five years of first collection, highlighting the need for continued collecting, biological collections as reservoirs of undescribed diversity, and calling for specimen revision after expeditions. These results raise concerns about the effectiveness of current taxonomic and conservation practices addressing the biodiversity crisis. We call for a global effort to prioritize taxonomic research and discuss taxonomic and conservation approaches. Under current practices, and given the observed timelines, we will lose the race against extinction for many species.