Two new species of Rhinophis Hemprich (Serpentes: Uropeltidae) from Sri Lanka

Abstract

Two new species of uropeltid (shieldtail) snake are described from Sri Lanka; Rhinophis lineatus sp. nov. from Harasbedda, near Ragala, and Rhinophis zigzag sp. nov. from Bibilegama, near Passara. The new species are distinguished from congeners in morphometric and meristic external characters, and in having very distinctive colour patterns. Scale-row reduction data are presented for the two new species; this is a new development for uropeltid systematics, and its potential utility is highlighted. The nature of the overlap between the two anal scales is also highlighted as a potentially useful character. The two new species were included in previous phylogenetic analyses of allozyme and albumin immunological data, but their phylogenetic relationships are not yet well resolved.

A new species of Uropeltis Cuvier, 1829 (Serpentes: Uropeltidae) from the Anaikatty Hills of the Western Ghats of India

“…Sex was determined by examining urogenital systems in situ through small ventral incisions in the body wall, or was inferred by examining numbers of subcaudals and/or relative tail length where these exhibited bimodal (presumably sexually dimorphic) variation-those specimens with longer tails being identified as male (see e.g., Wall 1919Wall , 1921Guibé 1948;Constable 1949;Gower et al 2008). Following Gower et al (2008) and Gower & Maduwage (2011) we made an effort to examine non-traditional characters for uropeltid taxonomy (see Table 1).…”

A new species of Rhinophis Hemprich, 1820 (Serpentes: Uropeltidae) from the Wayanad region of peninsular India

“…Sex was determined by observing everted hemipenes, or by examining urogenital systems in situ through small ventral incisions in the body wall. Following Gower et al (2008), Gower & Maduwage (2011) and Jins et al (2018), we made an effort to examine non-traditional characters for uropeltid taxonomy.…”