New occurrence of Sinovipera sichuanensis in Guizhou

Qin LIU1, 2,Guang-Hui ZHONG1, 3, Shi-Ze LI4, Jing-Cai Lü4, Peng GUO1,*

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New occurrence ofin Guizhou

Qin LIU,Guang-Hui ZHONG, Shi-Ze LI, Jing-Cai Lü, Peng GUO

1.College of Life Sciences and Food Engineering, Yibin University, Yibin 644007, China 2. College of Life Sciences, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610064, China 3. College of Tourism and Urban-Rural Planning, Chengdu University of Technology, Chengdu 610059, China 4. Zunyi Medical University, Zunyi 563003, China

Three Asian green pit vipers were collected in August 2013 during a field trip in Fanjin Mt. National Conservation Area, Guizhou. These specimens were identified as,based on subsequent examination and comparison. This is a new record of the genusandin Guizhou, and the first time that male specimens have been collected in the field.

Snake; Hemipenis; Distribution; Morphology

During a field trip to Fanjing Mt. National Conser-vation Area in August 2013, three male specimens of the Asian green pit viper were collected at Jiangkou County, which were later identified as(Guo & Wang, 2011). This is the first time thathas been found outside the type locality (Hejiang County, Sichuan), and also the first time that male samples have been collected in the field. We record and describe them in this paper. All specimens (YBU13226~28) were deposited in the Zoology Diversity and Evolution Lab of Yibin University.

EXTERNAL MORPHOLOGY

The following description is based on the speci-mens YBU13226, YBU13227, and YBU13228.

All three specimens collected are male. The body is elon-gated, cylindrical, and stout. Total body length (TL) ranges from 865 mm to 920 mm; snout-vent length (SVL) ranges from 690 mm to 740 mm; tail length (TAL) ranges from 165 mm to180 mm. Head is distin-ctly triangular and elongated, distinct from the neck. Dorsal body is nearly uniformly green, lacking posto-rbital and ventrolateral stripes; the upper lips are slightly lighter. The tail is distinctly prehensile, with one quarter to one third of the TAL rusty red dorsally. Below the head, the body and tail are yellow white; the eye is deep red and the pupil is vertical.

The top of the head is covered with small scales; supraoculars are the largest paired scales. There are 11-12 small scales between the supraoculars. Internasals are separated by one small scale, and do not touch the rostral. The rostral is trapeziform and invisible from above. Supraoculars are bordered by 7?10 small scales (excluding postoculars and preoculars). There are three elongated preoculars, the middle and lower ones and the third supralabial forming the border of the pit cavity. Postoculars 3 or 2, the lowest one elongated and extending beyond the eye, the subocular one elongated and forming the lower edge of the eye. Supralabials 9 or 10 on both sides; the first separated from the nasal by a distinct suture; the second is the highest, forming the anterior border of the pit cavity and separated from the nasal by two small vertically arranged scales; the third is the largest, separated from the eye by an elongated postocular; the fourth supralabial is separated from the eye by three scales, with the upper two in line. Infralabials 11-14, the first pair elongated and contacted after the mental. One pair of chin shields, contacting with the first three pairs of infralabials. There are 5?7 small scales in a line between the first preventral and the chin shields. Body scales feebly keeled except the outer two to three rows.

Ventrals 170?179; anal entire; dorsal scales 21-21-15 rows. Body scale reduction from 21 to 19 rows (21/19VS), from 19 to 17 rows (19/17VS), and from 17 to 15 rows (17/15VS) occurs at the 107, 114, and 123ventral positions, respectively. Subcaudals 68?74 pairs; scale reduction from 8 to 6 rows (8/6SC) and from 6 to 4 rows (6/4SC) occurs at the 11and 28subcaudals, respectively.

The retracted hemipenis is forked at the 4to 5subcaudal, extending to the 7th to 8th subcaudal plates. Sulcus is prominent, forked at the 2subcaudal, extending to the tips of the organ. The base of the organ is covered with tiny spines, but change to larger hard spines gradually. It is calyculate distally, without spines. The demarcation between spines and calyces is distinct but does not extend in a straight line across the organ.

The specimens were collected in two close locations beside streams in an evergreen forest at an elevation of 878 m (N27°59', E108° 46'), with two specimens found beside a large stone at about 2000h after rain.

DISCUSSION

was initially described based on two females from Hejiang, Sichuan, in 2011 (Guo & Wang, 2011). It has not been found in other loca-lities previously. The occurrence ofin Jiangkou, Guizhou, not only expands it distribution, but the collection of males provides further diagnostics data.

After a morphological comparison between the three males collected from Guizhou and the two fem-ales from the type locality, we found these specimens showed a very similar external morphology including scalation and color. For example, they were uniformly green in body, without postorbital and ventrolateral stripes; the ventrals and subcaudals did not vary significantly; they has similar dorsal (21/19VS, 19/17VS, 17/15VS) and subcaudal (8/6SC, 6/4SC) scale reduction patterns (Table 1). Based on the five specimens, however, the females were obviously longer than the males. The SVL of the two females was up to 1,010 mm, while the longest male was 740 mm. Due to the small number of samples, we cannot be sure whether the differences between the two sexes are significant, or whether they are the result of sexual polymorphism.

Table 1 Morphological comparison of Sinovipera sichuanensis

andare sympatric in Hejiang and Jiangkou; however, there are several external morphological differences between them: 1. lateral stripes are absent in(Figure 1, Figure 2), but red and/or white stripes are present in(David et al, 2002; Zhao, 2006) (Figure3); 2.is obviously larger thanin body size. The largestis about 625 mm in males and 765 mm in females (David et al, 2001, 2002), while the largest male ofis 920 mm and the largest female is 1,220 mm in total body length.

On the basis of retracted hemipenis morphology, that is, deeply forked, spinous proximally and calyc-ulatedistally,appears similar to snakes ofbut distinctly different from(Guo & Zhang, 2001). Whether the similarity betweenandspecies indicates they have a close relationship might be resolved by further molecular phylogeny research.

In the description of, Guo & Wang (2011) predicted the possibility that this species inhabited Chongqing and Guizhou, and its occurrence in Jiangkou, Guizhou, confirmed this speculation. With further study and extensive sampling,may be found in more localities between Hejiang and Jiangkou.

Figure 1 General view of adult malefrom Jiangkou, Guizhou

Figure 2 Holotype of(female) from Hejiang, Sichuan

Figure 3 Adult malefrom Jiangkou, Guizhou

Acknowledgments: We would like to thank Dr. Wei G from Guiyang University, and Xie YL and Cai YJ from Yibin University for their field assistance.

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20 December 2013; Accepted: 23 April 2014

This project was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC 31372152), the Scientific Research Fund of Sichuan Provincial Education Department (13TD 0027) to PG, and the Fanjing Mt. National Nature Conservation Area

, E-mail: ybguop@163.com