Acontias orientalis HEWITT, 1937

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Higher Taxa	Scincidae, Acontiinae (Acontidae), Scincoidea, Sauria, Squamata (lizards)
Subspecies
Common Names	E: Eastern Striped Blindworm, Eastern Cape Legless Skink
Synonym	Acontias meleagris lineicauda HEWITT 1937: 39 Acontias meleagris orientalis HEWITT 1937: 41 Acontias plumbeus tasmani HEWITT 1937: 44 Acontias meleagris orientalis — FITZSIMONS 1943: 244 Acontias plumbeus tasmani — FITZSIMONS 1943: 250 Acontias percivali tasmani — BROADLEY & GREER 1969: 21 Acontias meleagris orientalis — BROADLEY & GREER 1969: 22 Acontias meleagris orientalis — DANIELS et al. 2002 Acontias percivali tasmani — DANIELS et al. 2002 Acontias percivali tasmani — HEIDEMAN et al. 2008 Acontias meleagris orientalis — HEIDEMAN et al. 2008 Acontias orientalis — LAMB et al. 2010 Acontias lineicauda — BAUER in BATES et al. 2014: 244 Acontias orientalis — BAUER in BATES et al. 2014: 247 Acontias lineicauda — CHAPPLE et al. 2021
Distribution	Republic of South Africa (along the more mesic eastern Cape coasts of South Africa) Type locality: Grahamstown.
Reproduction	ovovivparous
Types	Lectotype: PEM R5128 (formerly AMG 7053, Albany Museum, fide FITZSIMONS 1943: 244) Holotype: Albany Museum (fide FITZSIMONS 1943: 251) [tasmani] Lectotype: PEM R5128 (formerly AMG 7053) [lineicauda]
Diagnosis
Comment	Limb morphology: Limbless. Type not in South Africa fide SAMA catalog (Anonymous 1958). Synonymy: Based on DNA sequence data, DANIELS et al. (2005) suggest that both A. m. orientalis and A. p. tasmani are invalid taxonomic designations, and should be regarded as junior synonyms of A. m. meleagris. LAMB et al. (2010) “regard these two taxa as being questionably distinct. Both names were proposed in the same work (Hewitt 1937), and we select the former, which has page priority as the senior synonym. Further work will be necessary to resolve these taxonomic ramifications.” Daniels et al. (2005, 2009) noted A. m. meleagris is paraphyletic at several levels, and a form they designated as A. m. orientalis “lineicauda morph” is also paraphyletic. LAMB et al. 2010 “recognize A. meleagris, A. lineicauda, and A. orientalis/A. tasmani as genetically distinct, morphologically diagnosable units”, however, note that their relationships are not clear. This uncertainty was maintained by Bauer in Bates et al. 2014: 244 although he listed lineicauda as valid species. Hybridization: Broadley and Greer (1969) noted on the basis of aberrant specimens that A. p. tasmani and A. m. orientalis may hybridize where they occur in sympatry.
References	Bates, M.F.; Branch, W.R., Bauer, A.M.; Burger, M., Marais, J.; Alexander, G.J. & de Villliers, M.S. (eds.) 2014. Atlas and Red List of the Reptiles of South Africa, Lesotho, and Swaziland. Suricata 1. South African National Biodiversity Institute, Pretoria, 512 pp. Branch, W. R. 1998. Field Guide to the Snakes and Other Reptiles of Southern Africa. 3rd ed. Fully Revised and Updated to Include 83 New Species. Ralph Curtis Books (Sanibel Island, Florida), 399 pp. Broadley, D. G. and Greer, A. E. 1969. A revision of the genus Acontias Cuvier (Sauria: Scincidae). Arnoldia Rhodesia 4 (26): 1-29. Chapple, David G; Roll, Uri; Böhm, Monika; Aguilar, Rocío Amey, Andrew P Austin, Chris C Baling, Marleen Barley, Anthony J Bates, Michael F Bauer, Aaron M Blackburn, Daniel G Bowles, Phil Brown, Rafe M Chandramouli, S R Chirio, Laurent Cogger, Hal Co 2021. Conservation Status of the World’s Skinks (Scincidae): Taxonomic and Geographic Patterns in Extinction Risk. Biological Conservation 257: 109101 - get paper here CONRADIE, WERNER; WILLIAM R. BRANCH, & GILLIAN WATSON 2019. Type specimens in the Port Elizabeth Museum, South Africa, including the historically important Albany Museum collection. Part 2: Reptiles (Squamata). Zootaxa 4576 (1): 001–045 - get paper here Cunningham, Michael, Catherine Lys Henderson and Krystal A. Tolley 2003. Herpetological Surveys. Cockscomb (T'Numqa) Mountain. African Herp News (36):22-25 - get paper here Daniels, S.R.; Neil J.L. Heideman, Martin G.J. Hendricks, Mphalile E. Mokone, Keith A. Crandall 2005. Unraveling evolutionary lineages in the limbless fossorial skink genus Acontias (Sauria: Scincidae): are subspecies equivalent systematic units? Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 34: 645–654 - get paper here FitzSimons, V.F. 1943. The lizards of South Africa. Transvaal Museum Memoir No.1 (Pretoria), 528 pp. Greer, Allen E. 2001. Distribution of maximum snout-vent length among species of Scincid lizards. Journal of Herpetology 35 (3): 383-395 - get paper here Heideman, N.J.L. et al. 2008. Sexual dimorphism in the African legless skink subfamily Acontiinae (Reptilia: Scincidae). African Zoology 43 (2): 192–201 - get paper here Hewitt, J. 1937. Description of new forms of the genus Acontias. Trans. Roy. Soc. S. Africa 26: 39-48 Lamb, T.; Biswas, S. & Bauer, A.M. 2010. A phylogenetic reassessment of African fossorial skinks in the subfamily Acontinae (Squamata: Scincidae): evidence for parallelism and polyphyly. Zootaxa 2657: 33–46 - get paper here Leonard, C. J. 1989. Locomotion of the Limbless Skink Acontias meleagris. J. Herp. Assoc. Africa (36): 73-73 - get paper here Wilson, B. A., M.G.J. Hendriks, N.J.L. Heideman, M. F. Bates, N. Don and C. Moses. 1998. Geographic Distribution. Acontias meleagris meleagris. African Herp News (27): 20-21. - get paper here Zhao, Z, Goedhals, J, Verdú‐Ricoy, J, Jordaan, A, Heideman, N. 2019. Comparative analysis of the eye anatomy in fossorial and surface‐living skink species (Reptilia: Scincidae), with special reference to the structure of the retina. Acta Zool. 2019; 00: 1– 13 - get paper here
External links	IUCN Red List National Center for Biotechnology Information Google images

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