A new species of Bothrops (Serpentes: Viperidae: Crotalinae) from Pampas del Heath, southeastern Peru, with comments on the systematics of the Bothrops neuwiedi species group

We describe a new species of pitviper of the genus Bothrops from the Peruvian Pampas del Heath, in the Bahuaja-Sonene National Park. Pampas del Heath is an area of seasonally flooded savannas and a northwestern extension of the Gran Chaco Boliviano-Paraguayo. The new species is easily distinguished from its congeners by the exclusive combination of dorsal color pattern of body consisting of small C-shaped blotches, postocular stripe originating posteriorly to the eye, covering posterior supralabials, dorsum of the head with paired markings arranged symmetrically, venter cream heavily speckled with brown, prelacunal scale discrete in contact with second supralabial, three to five prefoveals, subfoveal single usually present, postfoveals absent to two, canthals two, seven intersupraoculars, one or two suboculars, two or three postoculars, seven or eight supralabials, nine to eleven infralabials, 26–27 interrictals, 23–25 middorsal scales, 172 ventrals in the female and 169–173 in males, 45 subcaudals in the female and 50 in males. We performed separate and combined phylogenetic analyses based on morphology and five mitochondrial genes and recovered the new species as a member of the Bothrops neuwiedi species group. All lineages of this clade inhabit the South American dry diagonal. This novel species of pitviper increases the known diversity of the genus Bothrops and adds to the number of described taxa from the unique and scarcely known ecosystem of Pampas del Heath.

Communities and occurrences of Squamata reptiles in different vegetation types of the Serra de São José, Minas Gerais, Brazil

The objective of the present study was to learn which species of Squamata reptiles occur in Protected Area São José, in Tiradentes, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Between November 2009 and December 2010 reptiles were captured. In total 157 specimens were recorded of 29 species, 16 snakes, 12 lizards and one amphisbaena. Among the snakes, Dipsadidae showed the greatest richness, with a total of nine species. The group of snakes had the highest number of species present in the community, but 79% of sampled specimens were lizards, Enyalius bilineatus being the most abundant species, with 21% of occurrence. The area with the highest richness was the Cerradão. The lower abundance was found in the Gallery Forest area (n=14), but it was the vegetation type with the highest equitability. Areas of Cerradão and Cerrado sensu strictu showed the most similarity. In these areas five species were recorded in common, Bothrops neuwiedi (n=3) being the only species of snake, and the two species of lizards most abundant in both environments were Enyalius bilineatus (n=32) and Ameivula ocellifera (n=19). Ophiodes striatus and Xenodon merremii were common to Cerradão and Dirty Field areas. There was no species recorded that were common to the environments of Cerrado and Dirty Field but two species not sympatric were found of the same genus, Tropidurus torquatus, which was found only in the Cerrado sensu strictu and Tropidurus itambere exclusively in Dirty Field. Since none of the rarefaction curves reached full asymptote, this highlights the need for further study due to the high probability of new species being recorded for the studied area.