Big-Eyed Mountain Keelback

materials_examined

Material: ILS H. 3705 (adult male; Fig. 1 D). Molecular results: A COI sequence obtained from ILS H. 3705 (GenBank accession number PX 851960) collected on Po Ma Lung was similar (96.19 %) to a sample attributed to Pseudoxenodon macrops from Mengzi, Yunnan, China (GenBank accession number OQ 416696). Wu et al. (2022) reported at least three lineages of Pseudoxenodon macrops from China. The type locality for Pseudoxenodon macrops is from near Darjiling, India and there is no associated molecular data for this species in this part of India. Further study is needed to confirm the identity of Pseudoxenodon cf. macrops on Mount Po Ma Lung. Comments: One adult male was encountered on the path at night in forest habitat on 09 August at 2259 m asl (22.601002 ° N 103.474241 ° E).

A preliminary survey of the reptiles of Mount Po Ma Lung, with two new country records for Vietnam

Description

Morphological characters of the specimens from Thanh Hoa Province agreed well with the descriptions of Smith (1943) and Pham et al. (2014): SVL 200.0–200.6 mm, TaL 37.0–40.0 mm (n = 2, subadults). Body cylindrical; head distinct from neck; snout elongate; rostral as broad as high, partly visible from above; internasals as wide as long, not in contact with loreal; prefrontal about half the length of frontal; frontal pentagonal; parietals longer than wide; nasal paired; loreal 1/1; supralabials 8/8, fourth to fifth entering orbit, seventh largest; infralabials 10/10, first to fourth bordering chin shields; preoculars 2/2; postoculars 2/2, bodering anterior temporals; anterior temporals 2/2; posterior temporals 2/2; dorsal scale rows 19–17–15, keeled; ventrals 158–160 in juvelines; cloacal scale paired; subcaudals 59–60, paired. Colouration in preservative. Dorsal surface brownish-grey with short white cross-bars of black edge; a large V-shaped black spots on neck; chin and venter yellowish-cream, with large black spots anteriorly (Fig. 6).

New records and an updated list of reptiles from Thanh Hoa Province, Vietnam

Ecology

Two subadults were found between 09:00 h and 12:00 h on the ground, near a slow flowing stream. The surrounding habitat was evergreen secondary forest.

New records and an updated list of reptiles from Thanh Hoa Province, Vietnam

Distribution

In Vietnam, this species has been recorded from Lai Chau, Lao Cai, Son La, Vinh Phuc, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Da Nang and Lam Dong Provinces (Pham et al. 2014). Elsewhere, this species is known from India, Nepal, China, Myanmar, Malaysia, Thailand and Laos (Nguyen et al. 2009, Uetz et al. 2024). Type locality: "near Darjiling" [Darjeeling, E India] (Uetz et al. 2024).

New records and an updated list of reptiles from Thanh Hoa Province, Vietnam