Micrurus spixii WAGLER, 1824
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Micrurus spixii
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| Higher Taxa | Elapidae, Colubroidea, Caenophidia, Alethinophidia, Serpentes, Squamata (snakes) |
| Subspecies | |
| Common Names | E: Amazon(ian) Coral Snake Portuguese: Boichumbeguaçu, Chumbeguaça, Chumbeguaçu, Cobra-Coral, Cobra-Coral-de-Pescoço-Amarelo, Cobra-Coral-Vermelha, Coral, Coral-Verdadeira |
| Synonym | Micrurus spixii WAGLER 1824: 48 Elaps Marcgravii — FITZINGER 1826:901 Elaps corallinus — SCHLEGEL 1837 (in part) Elaps spixii BOULENGER 1896 Elaps ehrhardti MÜLLER 1926: 198 Elaps ehrhardti MÜLLER 1926:198 Micrurus spixii spixii — SCHMIDT & WALKER 1943: 294 Micrurus spixiii martiusi SCHMIDT 1953: 175 Micrurus spixii spixii — PETERS & OREJAS-MIRANDA 1970: 217 Micrurus spixii spixii — WELCH 1994: 89 Micrurus spixii — KORNACKER 1999: 159 Micrurus spixii spixii — CAMPBELL & LAMAR 2004: 228 Micrurus spixii martiusi — CAMPBELL & LAMAR 2004: 228 Micrurus spixiii martiusi — FROTA et al. 2005 Micrurus spixiii martiusi — FEITOSA et al. 2007 Micrurus spixii — GOWER et al. 2012: 94 Micrurus spixii — WALLACH et al. 2014: 454 Micrurus spixii — NOGUEIRA et al. 2019 |
| Distribution | Brazil (Amazonas, Para, Tocantins, Mato Grosso), S Venezuela, S Colombia, NW Bolivia, Ecuador spixii: Brazil (Amazonas), S Venezuela martiusi: Brazil (lower Amazon of Para, NE Mato Grosso); Type locality: Santarem, Pard, Brazil. Type locality: “Habitat rarus ad flumen Solimöens” [Brazil, Rio Solimões] according to the original description and Vanzolini (1981) |
| Reproduction | oviparous |
| Types | Holotype: ZSM 209/0, male, collected by Spix and Martius expedition to Brazil, 1817-1820; cited erroneously as ZMH 209/1 by Nascimento et al. 2019. Holotype: MCZ 2612, male [martiusi] Holotype: ZSM 203/1925 (incorrectly given as ZSM 140/1925 in the original description), male, “Manacapurú am Solimoëns, Brasilien”, collected by W. Ehrhardt, 08.06.1925 [ehrhardti] |
| Diagnosis | Diagnosis: (1) Dorsal pattern of yellow, red, and black triads; (2) hemipenis and tail relatively short; (3) two supralabials entering orbit; (4) mental usually separated from chinshields by medial contact of first pair of infralabials; (5) anal scale usually divided; (6) first triad incomplete: one black ring on neck, its anterior margin nearly vertical; (7) dorsal scales of head (including parietals) black with light edges; (8) scales in yellow rings with heavier black apices than scales in red rings; (9) black rings about as long dorsally as ventrally, complete except for black ring straddling the vent; (10) mental usually immaculate, some black edging of more posterior scales on underside of head; (11) 5.33-7.67 (4-9 in specimens from outside Bolivia, Roze, 1996) triads on body and 0.67-1.33 triad on tail [HARVEY et al. 2003]. Nascimento et al. 2019 distinguished M. spixii from M. obscurus (in parenthesis) by the combination of the following characters: black cephalic cap (vs. cephalic cap absent, with red parietal region), hemipenial body with spines dispersed on the asulcate surface (vs. spines arranged in rows on the asulcate surface), capitate condition of hemipenis (vs. organ partially-capitate), narrow parietal bone with posterior angular borders (vs. enlarged parietal bone with elliptical posterior border), and relatively long venom inoculating fangs (vs. relatively short venom inoculating fangs). Comparisons. Micrurus spixii differs from M. obscurus by having black cephalic cap connected to first black body ring, hemipenis capitate, and fangs long in relation to maxillary and slightly inclined anteriorly (vs. black cephalic cap absent, black interorbital bar, first black ring separated from parietal and temporals by a narrow white ring, non-capitate hemipenis, and short fang in relation to the maxillary, inclined anteriorly); differs from M. brasiliensis, M. frontalis and M. ibiboboca by having black cephalic cap in contact with the first body ring, first triad incomplete and less than 10 complete body triads (vs. black cephalic cap absent or not connected to the first black body ring, white snout, first triad complete, more than 10 complete body triads); differs from M. diana by having first incomplete triad and body triads 4–10 (vs. first complete triad and body triads 9–15); differs from M. filiformis by having ventrals 174–232, subcaudals 17–26, body triads 4–10, first triads incomplete, and black cephalic cap (vs. ventrals 239–329, subcaudals 37–46, complete body triads 10-22 and black cephalic cap absent); differs from complex M. lemniscatus species by having black cephalic cap connected to first body ring, first body triad incomplete, white body rings extend beyond four dorsal rows (vs. tricolor head in M. l. diutius, M. l. carvalhoi and M. l. lemniscatus, and white body rings do not exceed four rows of dorsal scales); differs from M. hemprichii by having divided cloacal plate and red rings (vs. cloacal plate entire and yellow rings); differs from M. surinamensis by having hemipenis without spinulate calyces, black cephalic scales with light borders, first triad incomplete, and supralabials 3–4 in contact with orbit (vs. hemipenis with spinulate calyces, red cephalic scales with black edges, first triad complete, and only fourth supralabial in contact with orbit) [Nascimento et al. 2019]. |
| Comment | Type species: Micrurus spixii WAGLER 1824 is the type species of the genus Micrurus WAGLER in SPIX 1824. See also ICZN opinion 1201. Morphological and biochemical evidence for the separation of Micruroides and Micrurus was presented by SLOWINSKI (1995). See also Silva et al. 2016: 54. Synonymy mainly after PETERS & OREJAS-MIRANDA 1970 and HARVEY et al. 2003. HARVEY et al. 2003 considered spixii and obscurus as separate species. However, Campbell & Lamar 2004 rejected the differences between the populations as insufficient to be different species and treated spixii and obscurus as synonyms. Kaiser et al. 2013 rejected the (sub-) generic names Binghamus Hoser 2012, Hoserelapidea Hoser 2012, Hoserelapidea Hoser 2012, Troianous Hoser 2012 invalid and rejected their use instead of Micrurus. Harvey et al. 2003 synonymized M. s. martiusii with M. spixii based on wide overlap of meristic and morphometric characters, which was confirmed by Nascimento et al. 2019. Distribution: not in Peru (fide T. DOAN, pers. comm., 4 June 2012). Not in Venezuela (Luis Esqueda, pers. comm., 21 April 2016, Natera-Mumaw et al. 2015 say it is M. obscurus which is in Venezuela but not spixii); See map in Nogueira et al. 2019. Venomous! Subspecies: Micrurus spixii obscurus (JAN 1872) has been elevated to full species status (but see Synonymy). Micrurus spixii princeps (BOULENGER 1905) is now considered as a synonym of M. obscurus. Mimicry: this species is mimiced by Simophis rhinostoma. |
| Etymology | Named after Johann Baptist von Spix (1781-1826), German zoologist. See Heinzeller (2006) and the Spixiana Supplement 1983 for detailed biographical data. The generic name is derived from the Greek words micro, meaning "little or short" and oura, meaning "tail," in reference to the relatively short tail in members of this genus. |
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