Mimophis occultus RUANE, MYERS, LO, YUEN, WELT, JUMAN, FUTTERMAN, NUSSBAUM, SCHNEIDER, BURBRINK & RAXWORTHY, 2017

"The species epithet occultus is Latin for hidden or concealed, referring to the cryptic status of this taxon and having been hidden in plain sight." (Reptile Database)

 

Description	"A species of Mimophis that can be diagnosed from M. mahfalensis by a combination of the following characteristics (see also Table 1): a narrow dark post-ocular eye stripe ≤2 temporal scales in width (vs. in M. mahfalensis post-ocular eye stripe >2 temporal scales in width, or indistinct and fused with the dark dorsal head colouration); 79-104 subcaudal scales (vs. in M. mahfalensis 44-88 subcaudal scales); and a generally larger tail length/SVL ratio of 0.33-0.43 (vs. in M. mahfalensis 0.20-0.36)." (Reptile Database).
Subspecies
Description
Synonym
Distribution	NW Madagascar (Mahajanga) Type locality: Madagascar, Mahajanga Province, Tsiambara Forest (-15.920716 S, 45.9886 E), 41 m elevation
Habitat
Food	It feeds on lizards, snakes and frogs. (2)
References	Raselimanana, Achille Philippe 2018. Unusual predation events in Malagasy amphibians and reptiles. Herpetology Notes 11: 659-662 - get paper here Ruane, Sara; Edward A. Myers, Kahmun Lo, Sara Yuen, Rachel S. Welt, Maya Juman, India Futterman, Ronald A. Nussbaum, Gregory Schneider, Frank T. Burbrink & Christopher J. Raxworthy 2017. Unrecognized species diversity and new insights into colour pattern polymorphism within the widespread Malagasy snake Mimophis (Serpentes: Lamprophiidae). Systematics and Biodiversity, DOI: 10.1080/14772000.2017.1375046 - get paper here (paper in the Psammophiidshare folder).
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 See: Reptile Database