Emmochliophis Fritts & Smith, 1969

Pyron, R. Alexander, Guayasamin, Juan M., Penafiel, Nicolas, Bustamante, Lucas & Arteaga, Alejandro, 2015, Systematics of Nothopsini (Serpentes, Dipsadidae), with a new species of Synophis from the Pacific Andean slopes of southwestern Ecuador, ZooKeys 541, pp. 109-147 : 119

Taxon classification Animalia Squamata Colubridae

Genus Emmochliophis Fritts & Smith, 1969

Emmochliophis fugleri Fritts & Smith, 1969 (type species by monotypy)

Emmochliophis miops (Boulenger, 1898)

Etymology.

From the Greek emmochlion for "a socket for a bar" and ophis for “snake,” referring to the unique interlocking vertebrae ( Fritts and Smith 1969).

Description.

Relatively small-sized (~250mm SVL) terrestrial snakes restricted to the Pacific Andean slopes of NW Ecuador, with a small number (<17) of maxillary teeth, 8 supralabials, 8 infralabials, fused prefrontals, internasals in contact, loreal absent, fewer than 150 ventrals, fewer than 100 subcaudals, dorsal scales in 19 rows without reduction, trunk vertebrae with lateral expansion of the zygapophyses, and expanded zygapophyses forming a rod-and-groove mechanism in Emmochliophis fugleri , but not in Emmochliophis miops .

Notes.

Both species are known only from the types. The hemipenis of Emmochliophis fugleri has been briefly described ( Fritts and Smith 1969), but prior to modern classifications of the organ ( Zaher 1999), and needs to be examined in more detail. The organ is unknown in Emmochliophis miops , as the sole known specimen is female ( Sheil 1998).