Xenocalamus mechowii

Xenocalamus mechowii
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Subphylum: Vertebrata
Class: Reptilia
Order: Squamata
Suborder: Serpentes
Family: Atractaspididae
Genus: Xenocalamus
Species: X. mechowii
Binomial name
Xenocalamus mechowii
W. Peters, 1881

Xenocalamus mechowii, or the elongate quill-snouted snake, is a species of venomous rear-fanged snake in the family Atractaspididae.[1] The species is endemic to Africa.[2]

Etymology

The specific name or epithet, mechowii, is in honor of Friedrich Wilhelm Alexander von Mechow, a Silesian-German explorer of Africa.[3]

Geographic range

It is found in Angola, Botswana, Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.[4]

Description

Dorsally yellowish with brown spots. Some spots arranged in alternating confluent pairs, others forming crossbands. Upper lip, sides of body, and ventrum unspotted.

A subadult 22.5 cm (8 34 in) in total length has a tail 3.5 cm (1 38 in) long.

Dorsal scales smooth, without apical pits, arranged in 17 rows. Ventrals 229-239; anal plate divided; subcaudals 31-36, also divided.

Head scalation same as Xenocalamus bicolor, except no supraoculars and two postoculars.[5]

Subspecies

Two subspecies are recognized including the nominate race.

Intergrades of these two subspecies can be found in North-Western Province, Zambia.[6]

Footnotes

  1. "Xenocalamus". Integrated Taxonomic Information System. Retrieved 29 August 2007.
  2. Xenocalamus at the Reptarium.cz Reptile Database. Accessed 12 May 2009.
  3. Beolens, B.; Watkins, M.; Grayson, M. 2011. The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. ISBN 978-1-4214-0135-5. (Xenocalamus mechowi, p. 174).
  4. 1 2 "Xenocalamus mechowii ". The Reptile Database. www.reptile-database.org.
  5. Boulenger, G.A. 1896. Catalogue of the Snakes in the British Museum (Natural History). Volume III., Containing the Colubridæ (Opisthoglyphæ and Proteroglyphæ), Amblycephalidæ, and Viperidæ. London: Trustees of the British Museum (Natural History). (Taylor and Francis, printers). xiv + 727 pp. + Plates I-XXV. ("Xenocalamus mechovii [sic]", p. 248).
  6. Broadley, D.G. 1971. "A revision of the African snake genera Amblyodipsas and Xenocalamus ". Occ. Pap. Natl. Mus. Rhodesia B4 (33): 629-697.

References


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