THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY

Amphibia    Anura    Hylidae  

Pacific Treefrog
Pseudacris regilla (Baird and Girard, 1852)
SOO-day-kriss — ree-JIL-lah

SSAR 9th Edition Comments:
 See comments under P. hypochondriaca. (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: 2023.09.19.11.01.29)
Download GeoJSON polygon range file: - 0.28 MB

Province/State Distribution:
Canada: British Columbia
United States: Alaska California Montana Oregon Washington

Taxonomic Etymology:
Named for its attractive, possibly regal appearance.
Pseudacris — From Greek pseudes (ψευδής), “false,” and akris (ἀκρίς), “locust.” Likely refers to their insect-like trilling calls—“false locusts.”
regilla — From Latin regilla, meaning “little queen” or “regal,” possibly chosen to reflect the species’ bright coloration or its prominence in western North America. The name was originally Hyla regilla, and the gender agreement retained the original epithet.

First instance(s) of published English names:
Oregon Wood-frog (Hyla regilla: Cooper, James G., George Suckley, William Cooper, George Gibbs, Asa Gray, and John L. Le Conte. 1859. The natural history of Washington territory, with much relating to Minnesota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oregon, and California, between the thirty-sixth and forty-ninth parallels of latitude, being those parts of the final reports on the survey of the Northern Pacific railroad route, containing the climate and physical geography, with full catalogues and descriptions of the plants and animals collected from 1853 to 1857. Bailliere Bros., London, H. Bailliere;, New York, New York. pp.); Pacific Hyla (Hyla regilla: Yarrow, Henry C. 1882. Check list of North American Reptilia and Batrachia with catalogue of specimens in U. S. National Museum. Bulletin of the United States National Museum (24):1-249); Pacific Tree Toad (Hyla regilla: Stejneger, Leonhard H. and Thomas Barbour. 1917. A Checklist of North American Amphibians and Reptiles. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts. pp.); Pacific Tree Frog (Hyla regilla: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Wood-frog (Hyla regilla: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Pacific Hyla (Hyla regilla: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Pacific Tree-toad (Hyla regilla: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Western Chorus Frog (Pseudacris occidentalis: Wright, Anna Allen, and Alex Hazen Wright. 1933. Handbook of frogs and toads. The frogs and toads of the United States and Canada Comstock Publishing Associates, Ithaca, NY. xi+231pp.); Pacific Tree Frog (Hyla regilla: 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:
1852 Baird, Spencer F. and Charles Girard. Descriptions of new species of reptiles, collected by the U. S. Exploring Expedition under the command of Capt. Charles Wilkes, U. S. N., First Part including the species from the western part of America. Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia 6:174-177
1899 Test, Frederick Cleveland. A contribution to the knowledge of the variations of the tree frog Hyla regilla. Proceedings of the United States National Museum 21(1156):477-492 + 1 plate
1923 Noble, G. Kingsley. The generic and genetic relations of Pseudacris, the swamp tree frogs. American Museum Novitates (70):1-6
1953 Mittleman, M. Budd and J. C. List. The generic differentiation of the swamp treefrogs. Copeia 1953(2):80-83
1968 Lyerla, T. A., and D. L. Jameson. Development of color in chimeras of Pacific tree frogs. Copeia 1968(1):113-128
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 Lannoo, Michael (Editor) Amphibian Declines: The Conservation Status of United States Species. University fo California Press, Berkeley. 1115pp.
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
2006 Recuero, Ernesto, Íñigo Martínez-Solano, Gabriela Parra-Olea, and Mario García-París. Phylogeography of Pseudacris regilla (Anura: Hylidae) in western North America, with a proposal for a new taxonomic rearrangement. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 39(2):293-304
2006 Recuero, Ernesto, Íñigo Martínez-Solano, Gabriela Parra-Olea, and Mario García-París. Corrigendum to “Phylogeography of Pseudacris regilla (Anura: Hylidae) in western North America, with a proposal for a new taxonomic rearrangement” [Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 39 (2006) 293–304] Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 39(2):511
2007 Moriarty-Lemmon, Emily. Patterns and Processes of Speciation in North American Chorus Frogs (Pseudacris). Dissertation. University of Texas, Austin. 304pp.
2013 Dodd, C. Kenneth. Frogs of the United States and Canada. John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland. 982pp.
2023 Dodd, C. Kenneth. Frogs of the United States and Canada. Second Edition. John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland. 1032pp.

THE CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN HERPETOLOGY — Accessed: Friday 05 December 2025 15:54 CT