There are rotund, short-legged frogs in several families (Nomura et al. 2009) that spend the majority of their time
underground but emerge with seasonal rains to breed. Microhylid frogs that lay aquatic eggs commonly behave in
this way, and the tadpoles are suspension feeders with depressed bodies, a reduced oral apparatus without
keratinized mouthparts, lateral eyes, and a midventral spiracle. The nonbreeding biologies of burrowing frogs are
poorly known, but Nasikabatrachus (Zachariah et al. 2012) and Rhinophrynus are known to remain active
underground, and at least juvenile Glyphoglossus forage above ground (A. Lathrop and G. Zug, personal
communications) during the rainy season. Various other burrowers aestivate while encased in epidermal cocoons.
Other than Otophryne (Otophryninae, South America) and Scaphiophryne (Scaphiophryninae, Madagascar), each
of which have different keratinized structures on the jaw cartilages, microhylid tadpoles lack keratinized
mouthparts, and except in one case (i.e., Otophryne), have a midventral spiracle. Glyphoglossus molossus, which
ranges from northern Myanmar through most of Thailand, Laos, and southern Vietnam at 200-600 m elevation
(Frost 2013), is a large, globose frog with an oddly truncate snout. The tadpole is morphologically a typical
microhylid (e.g., Inthara et al. 2005) but has a unique coloration. Aran et al. (2012) and Inthara et al. (2005) both
presented photographs of a tadpole and mouthparts, and the former included drawings of the buccopharyngeal
papillae. Savage (1952) presented sketches of the mouthparts and buccopharyngeal anatomy of the tadpoles of
Calluella and Glyphoglossus. We describe the breeding behavior of Glyphoglossus based on still and video images,
and new data are added for the tadpoles of Glyphoglossus and Calluella