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Telescopus obtusus (REUSS, 1834)

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Higher TaxaColubridae, Colubrinae, Colubroidea, Caenophidia, Alethinophidia, Serpentes, Squamata (snakes)
Subspecies 
Common NamesE: Egyptian Catsnake
G: Ägyptische Katzennatter 
SynonymColuber obtusus REUSS 1834: 137
Telescopus obtusus — DUMÉRIL & BIBRON 1854: 1056
Tarbophis obtusus — BOULENGER 1895
Tarbophis obtusus — WERNER 1919
Tarbophis obtusus — SCORTECCI 1932
Telescopus dhara obtusus — PARKER 1949
Telescopus dhara obtusus — LOVERIDGE 1955
Telescopus dhara obtusus — MARX 1956
Telescopus dhara obtusus — SOCHUREK 1979
Telescopus obtusus — BÖHME 1989
Telescopus obtusus — SCHLEICH, KÄSTLE & KABISCH 1996: 524
Telescopus dhara obtusus — BONS & GENIEZ 1996
Telescopus obtusus — CHIPPAUX 2001: 155
Telescopus obtusus — CHIPPAUX 2006: 161
Telescopus obtusus — TRAPE & MANÉ 2006: 162
Telescopus obtusus — VENCHI & SINDACO 2006: 293
Telescopus dhara obtusus — CROCHET et al. 2008
Telescopus obtusus — WALLACH et al. 2014: 712
Telescopus obtusus — ŠMÍD et al. 2019 
DistributionAlgeria, Egypt, Ethiopia [HR 31: 58], Eritrea [HR 31: 58], Sudan, Somalia, N Kenya, Tanzania [HR 31: 58], Central African Republic, Chad, Uganda

Type locality: Egypt  
Reproductionoviparous (not imputed, fide Zimin et al. 2022) 
TypesLectotype: SMF 19664 (formerly 9053a) 
DiagnosisDiagnosis: An northern African form of Telescopus with the following characters combination: head broad, usually well separated from body, longer than in tripolitanus, shorter than in dhara, with sub-rectangular snout; head never darker than body; pileus uniform or with dark lines or spots; a dark longitudinal line along head side (along upper edge of supralabials) apparently present in life in all or most specimens but sometimes difficult to see in preserved specimens; supralabials pale before the eye, pale with dark upper edge after the eye; body coloration pale to dark, creamy-brown, olive-brown, yellowish- to orange-brown; dorsum either uniform or with more than 50 dark blotches, sometimes poorly marked but separated by contrasting narrow (1 scale wide) pale transverse lines as in dhara, sometimes with contrasting rectangular or oblique dark blotches (pale brown to dark brown); flanks rather uniform or, in the blotched morph, with two rows of dark spots, of similar coloration to the marks on dorsum; belly uniformly pale. Mid-body scale rows 21 – 23, most often 23 (up to 25 according to Parker, 1949); ventral scales 240–270 in our small sample (230 – 278 according to Parker, 1949), 61–87 paired subcaudal scales in our small sample (down to 57 according to Parker, 1949); anal plate usually divided (Parker, 1949). 9–11 (sometime 8 on one side) upper labials, usually 10 or 11, of which three (usually 4, 5, 6), sometimes two on one side, touch the eye.
For separation from tripolitanus and gezirae see these species. Separated from dhara by differences in frequency of specimens with divided anal (common in obtusus, rare in dhara), 22 or 23 dorsal scales rows (approx. 75% in obtusus, very rare in dhara), and 10 or 11 supralabials (approx. 76% in obtusus, 6% in dhara). None of these characters is diagnostic alone, but differences in head shape, body coloration and coloration pattern of head allow unambiguous assignment of all individuals that we seen in pictures or as specimens. For separation from somalicus, see that taxon below.
Note: there seems to be some geographical components in the variation in coloration. Most Egyptian specimens except in the south are uniform or weakly contrasted (own observation, Baha El Din pers. com.) while the blotched morph is apparently the most common form in extreme southern Egypt (pictures from Aswan and Gebel Elba) southward (Ethiopia, Sudan, Djibouti) and in central Sahara (Southern Algeria, Chad). (Crochet et al. 2008) 
CommentVenomous, but usually not dangerous to humans.

Synonymy: Leptodira tripolitana WERNER 1909 has been removed from the synonymy of T. (dhara) obtusus and is now considered as valid species, Telescopus tripolitanus.

Distribution: See maps in Schleich et al. 1996: 526, Geniez 2016: 204, Crochet et al. 2008: 30 (Fig. 2), Šmíd et al. 2019: 39 (Fig. 1). Reports from Libya westwards (Morocco, Algeria (Joger in Böhme et al.), Tunisia [gabesi = gabesiensis], Mali?, N Nigeria?, Sierra Leone) belong probably to T. tripolitanus (as T. guidimakaensis; see Geniez et al. 2004). Spawls et al. 2018 apparently considered this species as a synonym of T. dhara.

Type species: Coluber obtusus REUSS 1834: 137 is the type species of the genus Telescopus WAGLER 1830.

Habitat: partly arboreal (Harrington et al. 2018). 
References
  • Aylmer, G. 1922. The Snakes of Sierra Leone. Sierra Leone Studies 5: 7-37
  • Boulenger,G.A. 1895. Rettili e Batraci. in, Esplorazione del Giuba e dei suoi Affluenti compiuta dal Cap. V. Bottego durante gli Anni 1892-93 sotto gli auspicii della Società Geografica Italiana. Annali Mus. civ. Stor. nat. Giacomo Doria (2) 15: 9-18 - get paper here
  • Chippaux, Jean-Philippe & Kate Jackson 2019. Snakes of Central and Western Africa. Johns Hopkins University Press, 448 pp. [detaileld review in HR 51 (1): 161] - get paper here
  • CROCHET, PIERRE-ANDRE; JENS B. RASMUSSEN, THOMAS WILMS, PHILIPPE GENIEZ, JEAN-FRANCOIS TRAPE & WOLFGANG BOHME 2008. Systematic status and correct nomen of the western North African cat snake: Telescopus tripolitanus (Werner, 1909) (Serpentes: Colubridae), with comments on the other taxa in the dhara-obtusus group. Zootaxa 1703: 25-46 - get paper here
  • Duméril, A. M. C., Bibron, G. & DUMÉRIL, A. H. A., 1854. Erpétologie générale ou histoire naturelle complète des reptiles. Tome septième. Deuxième partie, comprenant l'histoire des serpents venimeux. Paris, Librairie Encyclopédique de Roret: i-xii + 781-1536 - get paper here
  • Geniez, P. 2015. Serpents d’Europe, d’Afrique du Nord et du Moyen-Orient. Editions Delachaux et Niestlé, 379 pp. [English translation published in 2018] - get paper here
  • Geniez, Philippe 2018. Snakes of Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Princeton University Press, 384 pp. - get paper here
  • Gruber, U. 2009. Die Schlangen Europas, 2. Aufl. Kosmos Naturführer, 266 pp.
  • Harrington, Sean M; Jordyn M de Haan, Lindsey Shapiro, Sara Ruane 2018. Habits and characteristics of arboreal snakes worldwide: arboreality constrains body size but does not affect lineage diversification. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 125 (1): 61–71 - get paper here
  • Kirchhof S, Wasonga V, Mazuch T, Spawls S, Malonza KP. 2023. An annotated checklist of the herpetofauna of the Sibiloi National Park in northern Kenya based on field surveys. Amphibian & Reptile Conservation 17(1/2) [General Section]: 1–18 (e324) - get paper here
  • Loveridge, A. 1956. On snakes collected in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan by J.S. Owen, Esq. Sudan Notes Rec. 36: 37-56 [1955]
  • Osman, H.E.S.I., & Sir, N.T.E. 1988. The snakes of the Sudan. 1. The snakes of Khartoum Province. The Snake 20 (1): 74-79.
  • Parker,H.W. 1949. The snakes of Somaliland and the Sokotra islands. Zoologische Verhandelingen 6: 1-115 - get paper here
  • Reuss, A. 1834. Zoologische Miscellen. Reptilien, Ophidier. [Coluber albiventris, Echis pavo]. Mus. Senckenbergiana, Frankfurt/M., 1: 129-162. - get paper here
  • Rouag R, Ziane N, De Sousa M 2024. A tentative list of reptilian fauna of Algeria and their conservation status. Biodiversity Data Journal 12: e120471 - get paper here
  • Schleich, H.H., Kästle,W., Kabisch, K. 1996. Amphibians and Reptiles of North Africa. Koeltz, Koenigstein, 627 pp.
  • Scortecci, G. 1932. Rettili dello Yemen. Atti soc. Ital. Sci.Nat. 71: 39-49 - get paper here
  • Sindaco, R.; Alberto Venchi & Cristina Grieco 2013. The Reptiles of the Western Palearctic, Volume 2: Annotated Checklist and Distributional Atlas of the Snakes of Europe, North Africa, Middle East and Central Asia, with an Update to Volume 1. Edizioni Belvedere, Latina (Italy), 543 pp. - get paper here
  • Šmíd, J., Göçmen, B., Crochet, P.-A., Trape, J.-F., Mazuch, T., Uvizl, M., & Nagy, Z. T. 2019. Ancient diversification, biogeography, and the role of climatic niche evolution in the Old World cat snakes (Colubridae, Telescopus). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution - get paper here
  • Sochurek,E. 1979. Die Schlangen Nordafrikas. Mitt. Zool. Ges. Braunau 3 (8/9): 219-226
  • Spawls, Stephen; Tomáš Mazuch & Abubakr Mohammad 2023. Handbook of Amphibians and Reptiles of North-east Africa. Bloomsbury, 640 pp. - get paper here
  • Trape, J.-F. 2023. Guide des serpents d’Afrique occidentale, centrale et d’Afrique du Nord. IRD Éditions, Marseille, 896 pp.
  • Trape, J.-F. & Mané, Y. 2006. Guide des serpents d’Afrique occidentale. Savane et désert. [Senegal, Gambia, Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger]. IRD Editions, Paris, 226 pp. - get paper here
  • 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. 1919. Wissenschaftliche Ergebnisse der mit Unterstützung der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien aus der Erbschaft Treitl von F. Werner unternommenen zoologischen Expedition nach dem Anglo-Aegyptischen Sudan (Kordofan) 1914. IV. Bearbeitung de Denkschr. Akad. Wiss Wien, Math.-Naturw. Klasse 96: 437-509 - get paper here
  • Zimin, A., Zimin, S. V., Shine, R., Avila, L., Bauer, A., Böhm, M., Brown, R., Barki, G., de Oliveira Caetano, G. H., Castro Herrera, F., Chapple, D. G., Chirio, L., Colli, G. R., Doan, T. M., Glaw, F., Grismer, L. L., Itescu, Y., Kraus, F., LeBreton 2022. A global analysis of viviparity in squamates highlights its prevalence in cold climates. Global Ecology and Biogeography, 00, 1–16 - get paper here
 
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