v13i2.331
Volume 13 | Number 2 | November 2024
Major Article
ISSN: 1800-427X (printed)
eISSN: 1800-427X (online)
DOI:10.47605/tapro.v13i2.331
Submitted date: 17 October 2023
Accepted date: 15 October 2024
Published date: 30 November 2024
Pp. 62–68. Pls. 9–11.
ON THE SYSTEMATIC POSITION OF THE WESTERN GHATS BRONZEBACK Dendrelaphis chairecacos (BOIE, 1827) (SQUAMATA: COLUBRIDAE) WITH RANGE EXTENSION TO GUJARAT
Dikansh S. Parmar*, Mehul N. Thakur, Amrut S. Singh, S.R. Ganesh & Gernot Vogel
*Corresponding author. E-mail: Ophiophagus_hannah10@yahoo.com
Abstract
We report on the molecular phylogenetic position of the Western Ghats bronzeback, Dendrelaphis chairecacos (Boie, 1827), and new sightings from Dangs in Gujarat and Goa State in western India. Based on COI genes sequenced from two samples from Goa and the Dangs, we report that D. chairecacos was 5.59–5.60% (the total percentage of divergence is 5.77%), i.e. with an intraspecific variation of 0.67% nearly about 0.01%, divergent from D. tristis (Indian sample). Our record from the Dangs extends its range northwards by 350 km (from Satara) in the Western Ghats. We also used the geo-referenced and identified photo vouchers posted in citizen science portals to conduct a MaxEnt species distribution modelling for D. chairecacos for the first time. Our analysis run based on 27 data points including the new Dangs record and a previously published doubtful record from Yercaud (Southern Eastern Ghats), showed that the probability of occurrence in both these regions was very low (<20%). Areas in Malabar and the Konkan Coastal Plains from Kanyakumari to the Goa Gap had the highest probability of occurrence (>75%). We uphold the taxonomic ambiguity of the individual from Yercaud lacking loreal scale (as D. cf. chairecacos) and maintain that D. chairecacos s.str. is known only from the Western Ghats. We also re-identified a specimen (ZSI-R-22185) from Goa as D. chairecacos, which may be its earliest precise record from Goa (in 1969). Thus far based on nine preserved and two uncollected specimens mostly from the southern parts of its range, D. chairecacos stands better characterised based on 12 more live specimens, all from the northern parts of its range.
Key words : bronzeback, Gujarat, Konkan Coast, MaxEnt modelling, new record, sequences, Yercaud
Section Editor: Suranjan Karunarathna
eISSN: 1800-427X (online)
DOI:10.47605/tapro.v13i2.331
Submitted date: 17 October 2023
Accepted date: 15 October 2024
Published date: 30 November 2024
Pp. 62–68. Pls. 9–11.
ON THE SYSTEMATIC POSITION OF THE WESTERN GHATS BRONZEBACK Dendrelaphis chairecacos (BOIE, 1827) (SQUAMATA: COLUBRIDAE) WITH RANGE EXTENSION TO GUJARAT
Dikansh S. Parmar*, Mehul N. Thakur, Amrut S. Singh, S.R. Ganesh & Gernot Vogel
*Corresponding author. E-mail: Ophiophagus_hannah10@yahoo.com
Abstract
We report on the molecular phylogenetic position of the Western Ghats bronzeback, Dendrelaphis chairecacos (Boie, 1827), and new sightings from Dangs in Gujarat and Goa State in western India. Based on COI genes sequenced from two samples from Goa and the Dangs, we report that D. chairecacos was 5.59–5.60% (the total percentage of divergence is 5.77%), i.e. with an intraspecific variation of 0.67% nearly about 0.01%, divergent from D. tristis (Indian sample). Our record from the Dangs extends its range northwards by 350 km (from Satara) in the Western Ghats. We also used the geo-referenced and identified photo vouchers posted in citizen science portals to conduct a MaxEnt species distribution modelling for D. chairecacos for the first time. Our analysis run based on 27 data points including the new Dangs record and a previously published doubtful record from Yercaud (Southern Eastern Ghats), showed that the probability of occurrence in both these regions was very low (<20%). Areas in Malabar and the Konkan Coastal Plains from Kanyakumari to the Goa Gap had the highest probability of occurrence (>75%). We uphold the taxonomic ambiguity of the individual from Yercaud lacking loreal scale (as D. cf. chairecacos) and maintain that D. chairecacos s.str. is known only from the Western Ghats. We also re-identified a specimen (ZSI-R-22185) from Goa as D. chairecacos, which may be its earliest precise record from Goa (in 1969). Thus far based on nine preserved and two uncollected specimens mostly from the southern parts of its range, D. chairecacos stands better characterised based on 12 more live specimens, all from the northern parts of its range.
Key words : bronzeback, Gujarat, Konkan Coast, MaxEnt modelling, new record, sequences, Yercaud
Section Editor: Suranjan Karunarathna
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