Histolytic Activity in Seasonal Hypertrophy of the Reproductive Organs of Hyla aurea

Abstract

WHILE not yet reported in other frogs or in Hyla aurea elsewhere, hernia occurs in 0.3 per cent of this species taken in the Wellington district. The hernias seen involve various portions of the reproductive system, and are related to seasonal prebreeding organ hypertrophy. In one specimen, the uterine portion of the oviduct was ruptured through the body wall between the lateral face of the ilium and the origin of m. gluteus, to form a large mass in the dorsal lymph space. This appeared to be hernia by dissection along an anatomical pathway by pressure atrophy, as also in a second example where part of the testicular fat-body ruptured into the dorsal lymph-space between the body-wall muscles and the muscles on the lateral aspect of the ilium. A portion of the posterior lobe of the right ovary in another frog had perforated the mm. abdominis transversus and obliquus internus. This also was interpreted as based on pressure atrophy¹.