Xenopeltis
| Xenopeltis | ||||||||||||
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Rainbow snake ( Xenopeltis unicolor ) |
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name of the family | ||||||||||||
| Xenopeltidae | ||||||||||||
| Bonaparte , 1845 | ||||||||||||
| Scientific name of the genus | ||||||||||||
| Xenopeltis | ||||||||||||
| Reinwardt in Boie , 1827 |
Xenopeltis is a genus of small snakes that includes only two speciesandlivesin South Asia from Burma to southern China to Java , Kalimantan and Sulawesi .
features
Xenopeltis species reach a maximum length of one meter. Their backs are black or dark brown and iridescent , their underside whitish. In adaptation to the digging way of life, the head is compact, flat and shovel-shaped. All tooth-bearing bones are very closely covered with many teeth. The dental (tooth-bearing bone of the lower jaw) is placed on the rest of the lower jaw bone so that it is very mobile, which means that the entire jaw apparatus has great mobility.
They combine progressive and primitive features. The progressive ones include the chin furrow and the large scalp scales, which are similar to those of the adder (Colubridae). The abdominal scales ( scutum ventrale ) are also large. The tail scales ( Scutum subcaudale ) stand in two rows.
The original features include the dentate intermaxillary and the presence of two functioning lungs , albeit of different sizes .
Way of life
The snakes are nocturnal and live on or burrowing in the soil of the rainforests, loose forests and also on wasteland on the outskirts of cities. Earth snakes feed on small vertebrates such as small mammals, amphibians, reptiles and also other snakes. Xenopeltis species are oviparous (laying eggs) and lay up to ten eggs.
Systematics
The systematic position of Xenopeltis was controversial for a long time. In the 1970s they were placed in a subfamily Xenopeltinae of the Boidae together with the Central American pointed head python ( Loxocemus bicolor ) and the African genus Calabaria . McDowell placed them in 1987 in his own family Xenopeltidae, which was established in 1845 by Charles Lucien Jules Laurent Bonaparte . In 2008 the family of Vidal & Hedges was placed in the superfamily Pythonoidea together with the pythons (Pythonidae) and the pointed head python after a phylogenetic study based on molecular biological principles .
species
- Xenopeltis hainanensis Hu & Zhao , 1972
- Rainbow snake ( Xenopeltis unicolor Reinwardt , 1827)
literature
- Chris Mattison: Encyclopedia of Snakes . BLV Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, 2007, ISBN 978-3-8354-0360-4
- K. Deckert, Gisela Deckert , GE Freytag, G. Peters, G. Sterba: Urania animal kingdom, fish, amphibians, reptiles. Urania-Verlag, 1991, ISBN 3-332-00376-3 .
- Vidal, N. & Hedges, SB (2008): The molecular evolutionary tree of lizards, snakes, and amphisbaenians. Comptes Rendus Biologies, doi : 10.1016 / j.crvi.2008.07.010
Web links
- The Reptiles Database Family Xenopeltidae (Sunbeam Snakes)
- Xenopeltis in The Reptile Database