Stegonotus poechi Werner, 1924 :32

Kaiser, Christine M., Kaiser, Hinrich & O’Shea, Mark, 2018, The taxonomic history of Indo-Papuan groundsnakes, genus Stegonotus Duméril et al., 1854 (Colubridae), with some taxonomic revisions and the designation of a neotype for S. parvus (Meyer, 1874), Zootaxa 4512 (1), pp. 1-73 : 49-50

Stegonotus poechi Werner, 1924:32

Taxonomic status. Valid.

Synonyms. None.

Original name. Stegonotus poechi Werner, 1924:32 .

Holotype. NMW 23406 ( Fig. 28 ; Table 1), an adult female.

Type locality. Written on the historic label affixed to the jar is the notation “Neu-Guinea?” [New Guinea?]. The specimen ledger in Vienna has no additional information. As is the case with the type locality of S. dorsalis (see above), this specimen came from the area Pöch (1908) called Monumbo, the hinterland of Potsdamhafen (ca. 4.2280°S, 144.9333°E).

Collection. The label on the jar lists “Coll. Pöch?” [collector Pöch?], and we were indeed able to confirm based on the original accession slips that the holotype of S. poechi was collected during the same voyage, and arrived in the same shipment, as the holotype of S. dorsalis .

Key characteristics of the holotype. 800 (860) mm SVL + 180+ (164+) mm TL = 1080+ (1024+) mm TTL. V ♀ = 199 (200), SC ♀ = 53+ (55+), SCR ♀ = O (O), D = O-19-O (19-19-17), SL E = 4+5+6 (4+5+6), SL = 9 (9), IL = O (10), IL G = 4 (4).

Key characteristics of the species. Given that only a single specimen of S. poechi appears to exist in museum collections, our species-level characterization is necessarily very general. Stegonotus poechi has a ventral count near 200 and, due to the broken tail, we are unable to make any statements regarding its subcaudal count or relative tail length. It possesses 19-19-17 dorsals, which is a unique count in the genus Stegonotus and similar to the count featured in some individuals of S. admiraltiensis and S. iridis (17-19-15; see below). A second unique characteristic is SL E = 4+5+6, which we have not seen as either a species-level characteristic or an aberrant count in the specimens we have examined. This high value of SL E is juxtaposed by the lower value of IL G = 4, in combination with a relatively high IL count (10).

Comment. To the best of our knowledge, this species has only been mentioned once in the scientific literature since its original description, in a listing of Stegonotus species by Loveridge (1948) without further information. Even though there exists only a single specimen, the unusual configuration of supralabial scales (4+5+6) and dorsals (19-19-17) indicate that this is likely not an aberrant individual but a distinct form, in light that neither of these scale patterns exist in any other specimen among the hundreds from museum collections we have examined.

Figures

FIGURE 28. Holotype of Stegonotus poechi Werner, 1924, NMW 23406, an adult female from near Bogia, Madang Province, Papua New Guinea. Shown are the entire specimen (TTL = ca. 1024 mm) in (A) dorsal and (B) ventral views, and its head in (C) dorsal, (D) right lateral, and (E) ventral views.