Rhabdophis formosanus (MAKI, 1931)
Can you confirm these amateur observations of Rhabdophis formosanus?
Rhabdophis formosanus
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| Higher Taxa | Colubridae (Natricinae), Colubroidea, Caenophidia, Alethinophidia, Serpentes, Squamata (snakes) |
| Subspecies | |
| Common Names | |
| Synonym | Natrix tigrina formosana MAKI 1931 Rhabdophis tigrinus formosanus OTA & MORI 1985 Rhabdophis tigrinus formosanus OTA et al. 1999 Rhabdophis formosanus — TAKEUCHI et al. 2012 Rhabdophis formosanus — YOSHIDA et al. 2020 |
| Distribution | Taiwan |
| Reproduction | oviparous |
| Types | Holotype: NSMT H-2967 |
| Diagnosis | Diagnosis: Rhabdophis formosanus has many subcaudal (≤ 80 in males, ≤ 77 in females). Therefore, subcaudal counts could distinguish R. formosanus from R. tigrinus and R. lateralis, except the Kyushu populations of R. tigrinus with partially overlap of the ranges (Ota & Mori, 1985; Ota et al., 1999). They can be discriminated by longitudinally narrower dark blotches counts from the neck to the fiftieth ventral (BB50), which is in the range 15–20 in R. formosanus but 7–14 in the Kyushu populations of R. tigrinus (Toriba, 1992; Ota et al., 1999). Therefore, R. formosanus has the diagnosability from R. tigrinus and R. lateralis by a combination of characters (≤ 80 subcaudal in males, ≤ 77 subcaudal in females, and BB50 in both sexes). On the other hand, we have found no key characters that collectively discriminate R. lateralis from R. tigrinus. Therefore, further studies are needed to identify them. [from TAKEUCHI et al. 2012). |
| Comment | Venomous! |
| Etymology | Named after the type locality (Formosa = Taiwan) |
| References |
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| External links |