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Platyplectrurus madurensis BEDDOME, 1877

IUCN Red List - Platyplectrurus madurensis - Endangered, EN
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Higher TaxaUropeltidae, Henophidia, Alethinophidia, Serpentes, Squamata (snakes)
SubspeciesPlatyplectrurus madurensis madurensis BEDDOME 1877
Platyplectrurus madurensis ruhunae DERANIYAGALA 1954 
Common NamesE: Travancore Hills Thorntail Snake 
SynonymPlatyplectrurus madurensis madurensis BEDDOME 1877
Platyplectrurus madurensis BEDDOME 1877
Platyplectrurus madurensis — BEDDOME 1886: 33
Platyplectrurus madurensis — BOULENGER 1893: 166
Wallia inexpectata WERNER 1925 (fide SMITH 1928)
Platyplectrurus madurensis — SMITH 1943
Platyplectrurus madurensis — MCDIARMID, CAMPBELL & TOURÉ 1999: 132
Platyplectrurus madurensis — DAS 2003
Platyplectrurus madurensis — WALLACH et al. 2014: 568

Platyplectrurus madurensis ruhunae DERANIYAGALA 1954
Plectrurus ruhunae DERANIYAGLA 1954
Platyplectrurus madurensis ruhane — KADAMBY 1997 
DistributionS India (Kerala), Sri Lanka

Type locality: ,,About Kodiukarnal on the Pulney Mountains (Madura district), 6000 feet elevation" [BEDDOME 1877]

Type locality: „Südindien (Pulney Hills, Madura)" [WERNER 1925]

ruhunae: Sri Lanka; Type locality: „Galle", district in the Southern Province, Ceylon [DERANIYAGALA 1954]  
Reproductionovovivparous 
TypesSyntypes: BMNH 1946.1.15.64 (formerly 83.1.12.52), 1946.1.15.78 (formerly 83.1.12.56) — 1946.1.15.80 (formerly 83.1.12.58); MNHN 95.115 (2 specimens).
Holotype: NMW 18511 [Wallia inexpectata WERNER 1925]
Holotype: NMSL (= CNM) R. S. 51 [ruhunae] 
DiagnosisDiagnosis: Differs from the Indian D. madurensis in color the number of ventrals and relative proportions of the cephalic scales. 
CommentSynonymy partly after Wallach 1988, Amphibia-Reptilia 9: 2.

Original description (ruhunae): Color: dorsally chocolate brown, supralabials light grey, infralabials each with a light grey spot, ventrals with a light centre and wide chocolate margin, the longitudinal rows of three costals on each side, of them with a large light spot in each scale. These rows of spots are reduced to one on the tail.
Scales: one supraocular, postocular and temporal, nasal entire, supralabials 4, the third suborbital, Costals 15.15.15, ventrals 1 subcaudals 10, biserial, terminal caudal scute subconical. 
EtymologyNamed after the type locality.

P. (m.) ruhunae is named after a place or region in Sri Lanka. 
References
  • Beddome, R.H. 1877. Descriptions of three new snakes of the family Uropeltidae from Southern India. Proc. Zool. Soc. London 1877: 167-168. - get paper here
  • Beddome, R.H. 1886. An account of the earth snakes of the Peninsula of India and Ceylon. Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. (5) 17: 3-33. - get paper here
  • Boulenger, G.A. 1893. Catalogue of the snakes in the British Museum (Nat. Hist.) I. London (Taylor & Francis), 448 pp. - get paper here
  • Das, Indraneil 2003. Growth of Knowledge on the Reptiles of India, with an Introduction to Systematics, Taxonomy and Nomenclature. J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 100 (2-3): 446-502 - get paper here
  • Deraniyagala. PAUL E. PIERIS 1954. Two new snakes from Ceylon. Proc. 10th Congr. Ceylon Assoc. Advancem. Sci., 1: 24.
  • Deraniyagala. PAUL E. PIERIS 1955. A colored atlas of some vertebrates from Ceylon. Vol. 3. Serpentoid Reptilia. Colombo, xix + 121 pp. - get paper here
  • Gemel, R.; G. Gassner & S. Schweiger 2019. Katalog der Typen der Herpetologischen Sammlung des Naturhistorischen Museums Wien – 2018. Ann. Naturhist. Mus. Wien, B 121: 33–248
  • Kandamby, DharmaSri 1997. Herpetological types reposed in the National Museum Colombo, Sri Lanka. Lyriocephalus 3 (1): 31-33
  • McDiarmid, R.W.; Campbell, J.A. & Touré,T.A. 1999. Snake species of the world. Vol. 1. [type catalogue] Herpetologists’ League, 511 pp.
  • Palot, M.J. 2015. A checklist of reptiles of Kerala, India. Journal of Threatened Taxa 7(13): 8010–8022 - get paper here
  • Pyron R. A., Ganesh S. R., Sayyed A., Sharma V., Wallach V. & Somaweera R. 2016. A catalogue and systematic overview of the shield-tailed snakes (Serpentes: Uropeltidae). [type catalogue] Zoosystema 38 (4): 453-506 - get paper here
  • Sharma, R. C. 2004. Handbook Indian Snakes. AKHIL BOOKS, New Delhi, 292 pp.
  • Smith, M.A. 1928. The status of some recently described genera and species of snakes. Ann. Mag. nat. Hist. (10) 1: 494-496 - get paper here
  • Smith, M.A. 1943. The Fauna of British India, Ceylon and Burma, Including the Whole of the Indo-Chinese Sub-Region. Reptilia and Amphibia. 3 (Serpentes). Taylor and Francis, London. 583 pp.
  • Wallach, Van; Kenneth L. Williams , Jeff Boundy 2014. Snakes of the World: A Catalogue of Living and Extinct Species. [type catalogue] Taylor and Francis, CRC Press, 1237 pp.
  • Werner. F. 1925. Neue oder wenig bekannte Schlangen aus dem Naturhistorischen Staatsmuseum in Wien. II. Teil. Sitzungsb. Akad. Wiss., Wien, Abt. l, 134: 45 - 66 - get paper here
  • Williams, Ernest E. 1959. The occipito-vertebral joint in the burrowing snakes of the family Uropeltidae. Breviora (106): 1-10 - get paper here
 
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