Tongue Movement and Role of Frenulum Linguae Effecting Tongue Movement during Prey Capture in Rana nigromaculata

This study investigated the tongue movement during prey capture by Rana nigromaculata and the location of the frenulum linguae, which effects tongue movement. The tongue of R. nigromaculata are elliptical at the anterior and concave U-shaped at the posterior. The location of the frenulum linguae of R. nigromaculata is located at the front of the submentalis. This is due to the location of the frenulum linguae, which has significantly effects the movement and the expandability of the tongue. In terms of mobility, the tongue of R. nigromaculata and the expandability of the frenulum linguae allow the tongue to increase in length two or more times compared to immobile tongue in the other species. The time required until the swallowing movement after looking at and capturing the prey was 0.692000 seconds. Filming prey capture with a high speed camera showed that the rear part of the U-shaped tongue captures the prey with an appearance of stretching out longer to the front of tongue and turning in a reverse direction to bring the prey to the mouth.