Report of Nagarjunasagar Racer Coluber bholanathi Sharma, 1976 (Squamata: Serpentes: Colubridae) from the Gingee Hills, Tamil Nadu, India

<b>New distribution record of Nagarjunasagar Racer <I>Platyceps bholanathi</I> (Reptilia: Squamata: Colubridae) in Sigur, Nilgiris landscape, India</b>

“…The specimen was found in a rocky habitat with dry thorn forests (Image 3), which is similar to earlier reported habitat of deciduous vegetation (Sharma 1976(Sharma , 2003, deciduous forest patch (Guptha et al 2012), rocky boulders or hillocks intermixed with sparsely scattered scrublands (Ganesh et al 2013), semi desert scrub forest containing evergreen thorny vegetation (Sharma et al 2013), scattered scrub vegetation and rocky outcrops (Seetharamaraju & Srinivasulu 2013) and mixture of dry deciduous scrub forest and thorn scrub (Smart et al 2014). This result clearly indicates the role of dry and rocky hills in supporting such species.…”

“…According to previous studies, the distribution of Platyceps bholanathi encompasses the discontinuous Eastern Ghats mountains in southern India, including the states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana (Sharma 1976;Guptha et al 2012;Ganesh et al 2013;Seetharamaraju & Srinivasulu 2013), Karnataka (Sharma et al 2013) and Tamil Nadu (Ganesh et al 2013;Smart et al 2014) …”

“…Platyceps gracilis (Günther, 1862) is another Indian species of Coluber, reported only from a few localities from four Indian states, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra (Smart et al 2014). P. gracilis scalation, morphology characters and habitat type is similar to Platyceps bholanathi (Ganesh et al 2013;Smart et al 2014); however, based on the following three major comparison characters with available literature clearly indicates that the Sigur specimen (P. bholanathi) differs from P. gracilis in: (i) Sigur specimen has 19:19:13 dorsal scale rows vs. 21:21:15 in P. gracilis (Ganesh et al 2013); (ii) Sigur specimen has a nuchal blotch that has a round posterior margin (Image 1a,b) vs. P. gracilis, the blotch usually appears to have an inverse V at its posterior margin (Smart et al 2014); (iii) Sigur specimen has a dark brown parietal bar that is interrupted laterally by light coloration at the posttemporal area adjacent to the parietal scales (Image 1a,b) vs.…”

New sightings of Nagarjunasagar Racers, Platyceps bholanathi (Sharma 1976), from Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, India

“…T he Nagardunasager Racer (Platyceps bholanathi) is endemic to southern India. The species' distribution is poorly known, with few scattered records that include the type locality in the Nagarjuna Hills in Andhra Pradesh (Sharma 1976), the Sheshachalam Hills in Andhra Pradesh (Guptha et al 2012), Nalgonda in Hyderabad (Seetharamaraju and Srinivasulu 2013), Thally in Tamil Nadu and Devarkonda in Hyderabad (Ganesh et al 2013), Bellary in Karnataka (Sharma et al 2013), the Gingee Hills in Tamil Nadu (Smart et al 2014), the Rishi Valley in Andhra Pradesh (Deshwal and Becker 2017), Sigur in Tamil Nadu (Samson et al 2017), and near the Lakshmi Narasimha Temple and in the Sanyasikundu foothills in Tamil Nadu (Melvinselvan et al 2018).…”

Recent records of the Nagarjunasagar Racer, Platyceps bholanathi (Sharma 1976), from Telangana, India

“…Other known localities from peninsular India (Fig. 2) are the Nagarjuna Hills, Guntur District, Andhra Pradesh (type locality of Sharma 1976); Kapilatheertham, Seshachalam Hills, Andhra Pradesh (Guptha et al 2012); Thally, Krishnagiri District, Tamil Nadu, and Devara Konda, Nalgonda District, Andhra Pradesh (Ganesh et al 2013); Bellary Gudda, Bellary District, Karnataka (Sharma et al 2013); Gingee Hills, Tamil Nadu (Smart et al 2014); Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh (Deshwal and Becker 2017); and Sigur, Nilgiris landscape, Tamil Nadu (Samson et al 2017).…”