Sepsophis punctatus Beddome, 1870

Venu, Govindappa, Balakrishna, Gandlahalli N., Mallikarjuna, Nagasandra A., Seetharama, Halemane G., G. Raju, Narayanappa, Ramakrishna, Sompalem, Venkatachalaiah, Govindaiah & Ganesh, S. R., 2024, On further specimens of the Spotted Eastern Ghats Skink Sepsophis punctatus Beddome, 1870 (Squamata: Scincidae) from Ananthagiri hills, Northern Eastern Ghats, India, Zootaxa 5424 (3), pp. 396-400 : 397-399

Sepsophis punctatus Beddome, 1870

( Fig. 1–2 )

Material Examined (n=5).— Bangalore Univ., Bengaluru—BUB 1651A , 1653 , 1671 , 1692 , 1693 coll. Venu Govindappa, Balakrishna, Chandrasekhar and Mohan on 9 th Dec. 2020 from Ananthagiri coffee plantation (18.257⁰N, 82.989⁰E; 1180 m asl) in Visakhapatnam district , Andhra Pradesh, India .

Description and Variation.— Body elongate, with tiny vestigial limb spurs with digits; head as wide as body; neck not distinct; tympanic hole partially covered by lateral body scales; snout rounded; body fairly cylindrical. Measurements in mm. — head length 4.5–8.2; head width 4.2–6.3; head depth 3.1–5.1; body width 4.2–6.9; eye diameter 0.4–0.7; eyetympanum distance 3.2–4.5; inter-narial distance 1.4–2.2; inter-orbital distance 3.1–4.6; eye-snout distance 2.8–4.2; eye-nostril distance 2.0–3.0; snout to vent length 75.0–173.0; tail length 21.0–73.0; total body length 146.0–194.0. Scalation. — Overall smooth and glossy, mid-body scale rows across trunk 20; mid-ventral scales along trunk from mental to cloacal region 100–112; mid-dorsal scales along vertebral region from parietal to sacral region 92–116; subcaudal scales (on complete tail, n=3) from posterior to cloaca to tail tip: 101–127; mental and genials somewhat large; ventral scales not quite discernibly larger than coastals, including ultimate row; rostral scarcely visible from above, broader than long; preocular 1; presubocular 1; postocular 1; postsubocular 1; supraoculars 4; supraciliaries 4; loreal 2 on each side of head; azygous frontonasal; prefrontals fused with one another at midline contact; frontonasals separate, overlapping at midline contact; prefrontals fused at midline contact; parietals crescent-shaped, in midline contact with one another; interparietals situated more anteriorly, than parietals; nuchals 2 pairs, smaller than and parallel to parietals; supralabials 6/6, 4 th touching subocular; infralabials 5/5. Colouration. — Dorsum sandy brown to slaty grey, with a pair of 10–15 large spots 2–3 scales big covering the first one third of the entire body, continuing further down as a pair of paravertebral black stripes formed by linear series of far more smaller and finer spots, continuing on to tail as multiple parallel spot-stripes; circumorbital scales black; lateral body scales black occasionally with some lighter brown spots and speckles; ventrolateral series of dirty white stripes formed by series of spots on each scale; venter progressively lighter culminating in a thin narrow strip of unpatterned white linear wash flanked on both sides by series of black dotted lines that get bigger and bolder in post cloacal region, along the subcaudals; tail end with black dirty random wash both dorsally and ventrally.

Field observations. - The specimens were found under rocks and fallen logs in well-shaded areas under the canopy cover within coffee plantations. They were seen resting underneath in a coiled position during the daytime. Upon detection, they started to move away and tried slithering under the nearby rocks or other such objects for cover, indicating their fossorial habits. Other (semi-)fossorial or rock/log-dwelling vertebrates sighted in syntyopy with this species include the elusive ground geckoes Cyrtodactylus jeyporensis ( Beddome, 1870) , C. nebulosus ( Beddome, 1870) , the uropeltid snake Uropeltis cf. ellioti (Gray, 1858) and the recently described caecilian Gegeneophis orientalis Agarwal, Wilkinson, Mohapatra, Dutta, Giri, and Gower, 2013 .

The morphology of our specimens is consistent with that reported for this species ( Beddome 1870; Boulenger 1887, 1890; Datta-Roy et al. 2013). The largest specimen reported by Datta-Roy et al. (2013) was CES09/984 measuring 198.1 mm in total (136.4 mm snout-to-vent and a tail 61.7 mm long), fairly comparable to our BUB 1651A that is 194.0 mm in total length. Beddome (1870) stated the holotype to be nearly 6 inches i.e. 152 mm. However, Datta-Roy et al. (2013) in their redescription gave the holotype’s snout-to-vent length as 102.0 mm. Boulenger (1887) stated that value as up to 110 mm that more or less tallies with an historical non-type BMNH 82.5.22.156 that is 112.0 mm ( Datta-Roy et al. 2013). Datta-Roy et al. (2013) remarked that Boulenger (1890) used only the locality data of the non-types but didn’t quite furnish morphological features. But our comparison of length values and the midbody scale row count 20 (vs. 22 in holotype fide Beddome 1870; Datta-Roy et al. 2013) given by Boulenger (1887, 1890) indicate that the non-types were featured in Boulenger’s work. Yet we concur in part with Datta-Roy et al. (2013) in that for such an uncommon species like Sepsophis punctatus these two non-types were not described in full or in a separate treatment by their collector Beddome or by Boulenger.

We encountered this species in December, whereas those reported earlier from Odisha were collected between May and October and those from Andhra Pradesh were collected in October ( Datta-Roy et al. 2013). This perhaps indicates that October-December may be a congenial season for finding S. punctatus . We hypothesize so, since the northeast monsoon rains and colder weather conditions may presumably cause fossorial reptiles to be at the upper substrata of the ground. We state this with a caveat that continued sampling at other times of year, especially at peak south-west monsoon (July-August) is also necessary to fully conclude so. To compare with the available data we revisit the type and non-type collection details. Using the skink’s length as a proxy for its age, the smallest (=youngest) specimen ever known (CES09/983) measuring 60.1 mm snout-vent length is fairly comparable to an historical non-type BMNH 82.5.22.157 measuring 63.0 mm (fide Datta-Roy et al. 2013). In our case, the smallest (=youngest) one measured 75.0 mm SVL (BUB 1692), well within the known range. It is not known, whether skinks with 60 mm snout-vent length were subadults or adults. Hence, nothing is known for sure regarding its breeding or young ones. No new information could be fetched by us during this work on these lines. We recommend further studies on this species.

In Andhra Pradesh, S. punctatus presently does not occur in any protected areas. The only one there in this landscape (Papikonda National Park) is located adjacent to the possible range of S. punctatus . Previous researches have made it very clear that the Visakhapatnam hills have rare, endemic and threatened flora ( Rao 1977; Reddy et al. 2006, 2008; Murthy et al. 2011). It has been suggested that the region is undergoing quantitative and qualitative decline and degradation at a dangerously rapid rate ( Reddy et al. 2010; Aditya & Ganesh 2019). As to the herpetofauna, many other rare, rangerestricted speciess such as the geckos Cyrtodactylus jeyporensis and Eublepharis pictus Mirza & Gnaneshwar, 2022 and the caecilian Gegeneophis orientalis are also endemic to this landscape and collectively experience these anthropic threats that affect S. punctatus ( Agarwal et al. 2012, 2013; Mirza & Gnaneshwar 2022). That apart, many of the above-listed lizards are also statutorily protected ones (Schedules I and II) as per the Indian Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 (emended 2023). A specific gap analysis of Protected Areas in this landscape reports large gaps that endanger the threatened flora and fauna in this biodiverse and vulnerable landscape ( Reddy 2010). So we strongly recommend an urgent declaration of protection of the Visakhapatnam hill range that is crucial for the continued survival of rare and endemic species like Sepsophis punctatus .

Figures

FIGURE 1. Sepsophis punctatus collage showing (a) hand-drawn illustration reproduced from Boulenger (1887), (b) entire dorsolateral, (c) entire ventral, (d) left and (e) right lateral views of the holotype. Photos: Patrick Campbell and Gernot Vogel.

FIGURE 2. Sepsophis punctatus recently collected BUB specimens (a-d) in life and (e-g) in preservation at the laboratory.