A new vine snake (Reptilia, Colubridae, Oxybelis) from Peru and redescription of O. acuminatus

Authors

Robert C. Jadin, University of Wisconsin - Eau ClaireFollow
Michael J. Jowers, Universidade do Porto
Sarah A. Orlofske, University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire
William E. Duellman, University of Kansas
Christopher Blair, CUNY New York City College of TechnologyFollow
John C. Murphy, Field Museum of Natural History

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-14-2021

Abstract

The Brown Vine Snake, Oxybelis aeneus, was until recently considered a single species, distributed from southern Arizona through the Neotropics into southeastern Brazil. However, newly conducted research restructured the species with a substantial taxonomic revision, recognizing five additional taxa (i.e. O. koehleri, O. microphthalmus, O. potosiensis, O. rutherfordi, O. vittatus) in this species complex. This revision focused on populations in North America, Central America, and northern South America while neglecting the southern portion of its distribution. Here, we examine the taxonomic history of the complex and use it along with specimen data to resurrect O. acuminatus from southeastern Brazil. Finally, we describe a new species from the Peruvian Amazon based on morphological characters. This work increases the species diversity of the O. aeneus complex to eight, and we expect further increases in biodiversity discoveries with continued exploration of the New World vine snakes.

Comments

This article was originally published as Jadin, Robert C., Michael J. Jowers, Sarah A. Orlofske, William E. Duellman, Christopher Blair, and John C. Murphy. "A new vine snake (Reptilia, Colubridae, Oxybelis) from Peru and redescription of O. acuminatus." Evolutionary Systematics 5 (2021): 1, https://doi.org/10.3897/evolsyst.5.60626

This article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0) License.