VTMaxHerp: a data set of Voluntary Thermal Maximum temperatures of amphibians and reptiles from two Brazilian hotspots.

Amphibians and reptiles are ectothermic animals and thus depend on environmental temperatures to maintain their physiological functions. Despite being poorly documented, data on thermal behavioral thresholds to avoid overheating in their habitats is essential to improve the understanding of their thermal ecology and physiology. Herein we provide a dataset of 312 individual voluntary thermal maximum (VTMax ) values, the maximum temperature tolerated by individuals before actively moving to a colder place, for 53 species of amphibians and reptiles of the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado savannas of southeastern South America. Voluntary thermal maximum values were recorded as the body temperature at which the individuals exited a heating box experimental setup. This dataset comprises 25 species of 15 genera and eight families of amphibians and 28 species of 24 genera and 12 families of reptiles. Of the total number of individual records, 67.9% derive from the Cerrado and 32.0% from the Atlantic Forest ecoregions. Overall, lizards had higher VTMax than amphibians and snakes, and individuals in the Atlantic Forest had overall higher VTMax values than the ones in Cerrado. This dataset is the first to compile VTMax values for South American herpetofauna, along with detailed experimental information such as heating rates and time to reach VTMax . This dataset provides a baseline for understanding thermal tolerances and requirements of Neotropical ectothermic vertebrate species, which might be useful for future research on the impact of climate change and to test novel ecological hypotheses.