THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY

Amphibia    Anura    Hylidae  

Illinois Chorus Frog
Pseudacris illinoensis Smith, 1951
SOO-day-kriss — ill-ih-noh-EN-sis

SSAR 9th Edition Comments:
 Barrow et al. (2015, Molecular Ecology 24: 4739–4758) determined that P. illinoensis separated from P. streckeri only recently, and although the taxa are not yet reciprocally monophyletic, they have already accumulated genetic differences. The authors advocated treating P. illinoensis as a genetically distinct management unit but did not advise on taxonomic revision. (Mendelson, Joseph R., III, Darrel R. Frost, Emily Moriarty Lemmon, and Maureen A. Donnelly. 2025. Anura – Frogs. Pages 1-9 in Kirsten E. Nicholson (Editor), Scientific and Standard English Names of Amphibians and Reptiles of North America North of Mexico, with Comments Regarding Confidence in Our Understanding, 9th Edition. Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles, Lawrence, Kansas. 87 pp.)

Range maps are based on curated specimens and provided gratis by CNAH.
(Created by Travis W. Taggart; Version: 2024.02.01.09.48.48)
Download GeoJSON polygon range file: - 0.48 MB

Province/State Distribution:
United States: Arkansas Illinois Missouri

Taxonomic Etymology:
Named for the U.S. state where it was first described.
Pseudacris — From Greek pseudes (ψευδής), “false,” and akris (ἀκρίς), “locust.” Likely refers to their insect-like trilling calls—“false locusts.”
illinoensis — Latinized geographic adjective meaning “from Illinois,” referring to the species’ restricted range in sandy floodplains of the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers.

First instance(s) of published English names:
Illinois Chorus Frog (Pseudacris streckeri illinoisensis: Schmidt, Karl P. 1953. A Check List of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. 6th Edition. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois. 280pp.);

Taxon Links:

  
Catalog of American Amphibians and Reptiles
  
Amphibian Species of the World
  
NatureServe
  
iNaturalist
  
GenBank
  
USGS - Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database

Selected References:
1923 Noble, G. Kingsley. The generic and genetic relations of Pseudacris, the swamp tree frogs. American Museum Novitates (70):1-6
1951 Smith, Philip W. A new frog and a new turtle from the western Illinois Sand Prairies. Bulletin of the Chicago Academy of Sciences 9:189-199
1955 Smith, Philip W. Pseudacris streckeri illinoensis in Missouri. Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science 58(3):411
1991 Collins, Joseph T. Viewpoint: A new taxonomic arrangement for some North American amphibins and reptiles Herpetological Review 22(2):42-43
1991 Collins, Joseph T. Amphibians and reptiles in the upper Mississippi river valley: Systematic and distributional problems. Journal of the Tennessee Academy of Science 66(4):149-152
2004 Moriarty, Emily C. and David C. Cannatella. Phylogenetic relationships of the North American Chorus Frogs (Pseudacris: Hylidae) Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 30:409-420
2005 Faivovich, J., C. F. B. Haddad, P. C. de A. Garcia, D. R. Frost, J. A. Campbell, and W. C. Wheeler. Systematic review of the frog family Hylidae, with special reference to Hylinae: A phylogenetic analysis and taxonomic revision. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History (294):1–240
2007 Moriarty-Lemmon, Emily. Patterns and Processes of Speciation in North American Chorus Frogs (Pseudacris). Dissertation. University of Texas, Austin. 304pp.
2014 Crother, Brian I. The bold taxonomic hypotheses of Collins (1991): 23 years later. Herpetological Review 45(2):268-272
2014 Barrow, Lisa N., Hannah F. Ralicki, Sandra A. Emme, Emily Moriarty Lemmon. Species tree estimation of North American chorus frogs (Hylidae: Pseudacris) with parallel tagged amplicon sequencing. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 75:78-90
2015 Barrow, Lisa N., Alyssa T. Bigelow, Christopher A. Phillips, and Emily Moriarty Lemmon Phylogeographic inference using Bayesian model comparison across a fragmented chorus frog species complex. Molecular Ecology 24(18):4739-4758
2016 Barrow, Lisa Evolutionary insights from analyses of spatial genetic variation in North American frogs. Dissertation. Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida. 186pp.

THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY — Accessed: Friday 05 December 2025 16:56 CT