Hydrophis tuberculatus Anderson, 1871

Mondal, Sonia, Ganesh, S. R., Sethy, P. G. S., Raghunathan, C., Raha, Sujoy & Sarkar, Sagnik, 2022, Redescriptions of the type specimens of synonymous nominal taxa of sea snakes (Serpentes: Elapidae: Hydrophis, Laticauda) at the Zoological Survey of India, Zootaxa 5169 (4), pp. 301-321 : 309

Hydrophis tuberculatus Anderson, 1871

synonym of Hydrophis cyanocinctus Daudin, 1803

( Table 1 ; Fig. 4 )

Material Examined. ZSI 8271 Holotype from Calcutta (in West Bengal Eastern India).

Description. Head robust, head shields large, regular; Rostral broader than high; Nasal superior in position, nasal shield in contact with each other; Prefrontal short, squarish, 2 nd supralabial touching prefrontal; Frontal shorter than the distance from the tip of the rostral; Parietal longer than wide; Temporal 2; One Supraocular on each sides of head; One Preocular on each sides of the head; Two Postoculars on each sides of the head; Seven Supralabials on each sides of the head; 2 nd touching prefrontal; 4 th and 5 th touching the eye, 4 th & 6 th broken; Nine Infralabials on right and eight on left side of the head; 3 infralabials touching chin shield; cuneate scales present; Chin shields well developed, both the pair in contact with each other Anterior Pair— 3.1 mm, Posterior Pair 3.7 mm; Scales around neck 31; Scales around Midbody 40; Ventrals 315, distinct from the adjacent dorsal scales; Preanal enlarged; Dorsal scales has a single keel. Head width 13.4 mm; Head depth 9.8 mm; Head length 26.8 mm; Snout to Vent length 1000.0 mm; Tail length 95.0 mm. Dorsally and ventrally the entire body light brown. Body encircled with dark brown bands, broader dorsally, disappearing ventrally. Number of bands 60 around the body till vent; Five dark brown bands on tail.

Remarks. Wall (1906) stated the scale counts to be 32:40:39 and ventrals as 332, whereas Smith (1926) stated it to be an unsexed young one with scale rows 31:42 and ventrals 310. Anderson (1871) originally named this species as Hydrophis tuberculata , with a feminine ending of specific epithet, whereas it must be masculine, as H. tuberculatus (see Uetz et al. 2022; this work). Sclater (1891) treated it as a valid species that he listed as Distira tuberculata . This was followed by Boulenger (1890, 1896). Wall (1906) synonymized H. tuberculatus under H. cyanocintus and this was subsequently followed ( Wall 1909; Smith 1926, 1943).

Figures

FIGURE 4. Holotype of Hydrophis tuberculatusZSI 8271, dorsal (top), ventral (middle) and lateral (bottom) aspects.Photograph by Zoological Survey of India, Kolkata.