Correction to Catalogue of herpetological specimens from Meghalaya, India at the Sálim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History (SACON)

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ISSN 0974-7907 (Online); ISSN 0974-7893 (Print) The following publication of this article (Journal of Threatened Taxa 13(11): 19603-19610). <https:// doi. org/10.11609/jott.7318.13.11.19603-19610>. Chandramouli et al. 2021, in their recent publication on the catalogue of herpetological specimens from Meghalaya, India, at the Sálim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History (SACON), presented imprecise information regarding herpetofaunal collection and its geographical location. However, it is necessary to correct the following inaccuracies and publish corrigenda to help prevent the misleading information from being repeatedly published in the future.
Specimen collection acts as a crucial repository that retains historical information on species dispersal patterns for decades (Da Silva et al. 2017). Therefore, it is essential to keep a check on the original collection material and its datum. Recent, Chandramouli et al (2021) have discussed merely handy specimens, but many more have yet to be documented (Ganesh et al. 2020 and Karthik pers. com.). SACON -Sálim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History now houses about 200 species of the herpetological collection. However, the precise number (of samples) is unknown, include the major contribution from Pandi Karthik & R.S Naveen and a renowned herpetologist Dr. (Late) S. Bhupathy's (see Ganesh et al. 2020). Nevertheless, SACON has published two series of catalogues on the care and maintenance of herpetological collections (Ganesh et al. 2020, Chandramouli et al. 2021a& 2021b. As it is catalogued and the specimens are vouchered for future studies, therefore the author ought to disclose the SACON accreditation for upholding a large number of specimens. Hence, in the future other researchers can access the specimens for taxonomical investigation, which will benefit herpetological conservation (Uetz et al. 2019).
(i) The author stated the collector name P. Karthik (instead of Pandi Karthik). The collector name is not included as an author and does not need to be abbreviated; rather, it should be the academic name.
(ii) Furthermore, the author failed to follow the worduniformity (i.e.) on species location and specimen voucher number; a few places the specimen voucher number comes along with institute acronyms (i.e., SACON VA 102) and someplace it does not (i.e., VA 72 & 73). (iii) Also, a paucity of information on preservation methods and collection permit information (follow Al-Razi et al. 2021& Mirza et al. 2021. As a concurring collector, the specimens were fixed in 7 % formaldehyde solution and later stored in 75 % ethanol. A few specimens of tail tip tissues were preserved in 95% ethanol for molecular work prior to specimen fixation (Mirza et al. 2021). For future taxonomical investigation, the specimens and tissue samples have been deposited in Sálim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History (SACON).

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(2021), based on their syntype specimens and geographic proximity; the author assumes and referred (SACON VA 57, VA 61) as L. cf. sylheticum. There is no evidence that Al-Razi et al. 2021 study has a sample widely (including Meghalaya) to prove L. smithi complicity. The study involves samples from a single location in Bangladesh named Lawachara National Park (LNP), approximately 220 miles air distance from the location collected by Pandi Karthik. Additionally, a given location has disjunctive biogeographic, it may be a factor attribute to speciosity (Agarwal et al. 2018). It cannot be synonymized with either L. sylheticum nor with L. smithi as it was referred to as Leptobrachium sp. until the integrated taxonomy attempt on the genus.  (Mian et al. 2017). Also, conferring the geographic proximity and the molecular nest provided. Therein, I refer to the species again as T. cf. albopunctatum. Furthermore, an integrated taxonomic approach would be a substantial in resolving species-level complications.

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