The snake Mastigodryas dorsalis (Bocourt, 1890) is generally considered absent from Mexico, but a few sources indicate otherwise. Herein we resolve this issue by re-examining a historical specimen and by reporting new records for M. dorsalis in Chiapas, Mexico. These records extend the known distribution of the species 87 km northwest of the nearest pre-existing record in Guatemala. Additionally, based on these new records and an exhaustive literature review, we present an updated distribution for the species and revise its known elevational range to 300–2110 m. A complete Spanish translation of this paper is available in the Supplemental Data. Una traducción completa al español de este artículo está disponible en los Datos Suplementarios.
The Tehuantepec Isthmus rattlesnake (Crotalus ehecatl) is a poorly known species endemic to Mexico. We describe its diet, morphological variation, life history traits and activity patterns based on data from field encounters, museum specimens, and published data. Its diet consists almost exclusively of mammals, with no detected ontogenetic shift or sexual differences in prey type, and with feeding happening mainly in the rainy season. As the first detailed study on the feeding ecology of C. ehecatl, it adds six new prey species and suggests a homogeneous diet among age classes and sexes, but not among seasons. Crotalus ehecatl does not present sexual dimorphism in snout-vent length, head length or total length, but males have significantly longer tails than females, possess fewer ventral scales, more subcaudal and anterior intersupraocular scales. Crotalus ehecatl showed a unimodal activity pattern with peak activity in the summer, with crepuscular and nocturnal activity during the warmer months, and diurnal activity during the cooler months. The timing of C. ehecatl reproductive events, is similar to other rattlesnakes from temperate and tropical zones. Additional studies on this and related species would help to understand how the ecology of Neotropical rattlesnakes differs from rattlesnakes of more temperate zones.
Se describe la distribución geográfica de cuatro especies de serpientes venenosas (Bothriechis aurifer, Crotalus simus, Micrurus diastema y M. elegans) que habitan en el área sureste de la Altiplanicie de Chiapas. Estas especies se encuentran en alguna categoría de riesgo en la NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010, se desconoce su distribución precisa y son de importancia médica. Los modelos de distribución se obtuvieron usando el algoritmo MaxEnt, para ello se usaron registros de museos nacionales y del extranjero, así como búsquedas en internet, en la literatura científica y muestreos en campo. También se realizaron entrevistas para determinar la percepción y la relación que tienen las serpientes venenosas con las poblaciones humanas. Además, se determinó la representatividad de cada una de las especies en las áreas naturales protegidas. Algunas barreras geográficas, como el Valle de Motagua, limitan la distribución de M. elegans y B. aurifer, mientras que el Istmo de Tehuantepec lo hace para C. simus. Se pudo determinar que B. aurifer es la especie más vulnerable, debido a su distribución restringida, y a que se encuentra poco representada en las áreas naturales protegidas. Son frecuentes las mordeduras de serpientes venenosas en algunas localidades. La víbora de cascabel (C. simus) es perseguida por el uso medicinal que le dan los pobladores. La información generada es fundamental para implementar programas de educación ambiental y acciones de manejo que contribuyan a la conservación de estas especies.
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