Dendrelaphis Explained

Dendrelaphis is a genus of colubrid snakes, distributed from Pakistan, India and southern China to Indonesia, Timor-Leste, the Philippines, Australia, New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. There are over forty described species. Asian species are known commonly as bronzebacks, while the Australo-Papuan species are simply called treesnakes. All are non-venomous and entirely harmless to humans.

Taxonomy

Dendrelaphis is one of five genera belonging to the vine snake subfamily Ahaetuliinae, of which Dendrelaphis is most closely related to Chrysopelea, as shown in the cladogram below:^[1]

Species

This list is based on the latest checklist of snakes in the world^[2] and recent revisions and descriptions published in the scientific literature. The authors of a 2015 revision of the Australo-Papuan Dendrelaphis species recommended the synonymy of D. solomonis within D. calligaster, the elevation of D. keiensis to species status, the resurrection of D. lineolatus from within D. calligaster, and the resurrection of D. macrops and elevation of D. striolatus from within D. punctulatus. They also confined D. punctulatus to Australia and D. papuensis to the Trobriand Islands of Papua New Guinea.^[3]

• Dendrelaphis andamanensis – Andaman bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis ashoki – Ashok's bronzeback tree snake^[4]
• Dendrelaphis bifrenalis – Boulenger's bronzeback – southern India and Sri Lanka^[5]
• Dendrelaphis biloreatus – Gore's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis binhi – Binh's bronzeback^[6]
• Dendrelaphis calligaster – northern treesnake, green treesnake, coconut treesnake
• Dendrelaphis caudolineatus – striped bronzeback, grey bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis caudolineolatus – Gunther's bronzeback tree snake
• Dendrelaphis chairecacos
• Dendrelaphis cyanochloris – blue bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis effrenis – Sinharaja tree snake
• Dendrelaphis flavescens – Sulu bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis formosus – elegant bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis fuliginosus – Philippine lamp-black tree snake
• Dendrelaphis gastrostictus – montane treesnake
• Dendrelaphis girii – Giri's bronzeback^[4]
• Dendrelaphis grandoculis – large-eyed bronzeback, southern bronzeback^[5]
• Dendrelaphis grismeri
• Dendrelaphis haasi – Haas's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis hollinrakei ^[7]
• Dendrelaphis humayuni – Nicobar bronzeback, Tiwari's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis inornatus – Lesser Sunda bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis keiensis – Kei treesnake
• Dendrelaphis kopsteini – Kopstein's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis levitoni – Leviton's bronzeback tree snake
• Dendrelaphis lineolatus
• Dendrelaphis lorentzii – Lorentz River treesnake
• Dendrelaphis luzonensis – Luzon bronzeback treesnake
• Dendrelaphis macrops
• Dendrelaphis marenae – Maren's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis modestus – grey bronzeback, striped bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis ngansonensis – Nganson bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis nigroserratus – sawtooth-necked bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis oliveri – Oliver's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis papuensis – Papuan treesnake
• Dendrelaphis philippinensis – Philippine bronzeback treesnake
• Dendrelaphis pictus – painted bronzeback, common bronzeback, Indonesian bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis proarchos
• Dendrelaphis punctulatus – common treesnake, Australian treesnake, green tree snake
• Dendrelaphis schokari – Schokar's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis striatus – striped bronzeback, striated bronzeback treesnake
• Dendrelaphis striolatus
• Dendrelaphis subocularis – mountain bronzeback, Burmese bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis terrificus – terrific bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis tristis – common bronzeback, Daudin's bronzebackack
• Dendrelaphis underwoodi – Underwood's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis vogeli – Vogel's bronzeback
• Dendrelaphis walli ^[8]
• Dendrelaphis wickrorum – Wickramasinghes' bronzeback

Description

Bronzebacks range in total length (including tail) from 2feet to up to 6feet. All species have a slender body with a long tail. Males are shorter in length and brighter in coloration; they also tend to be more active. Females are stouter with duller or darker colorations and are less active. Typical coloration includes red, brown, or orange on the head with bronze, brown, or olive-green running down the length of the back. The underside of the body is usually bright to pale green or yellow. They have big eyes and bright red tongues. The tail is fully prehensile.

Diet

The primary prey of Dendrelaphis species consists of lizards and frogs, but the larger species are capable of taking birds, bats, and small rodents.

Further reading

• Boulenger GA (1894). Catalogue of the Snakes in the British Museum (Natural History). Volume II., Containing the Conclusion of the Colubridæ Aglyphæ. London: Trustees of the British Museum (Natural History). (Taylor and Francis, printers). xi + 382 pp. + Plates I-XX. (Genus Dendrelaphis, p. 87, Figure 7).
• Book: Gow GF. species:Graeme Francis Gow. Snakes of Australia, Completely Revised Edition. Sydney. HarperCollins Australia. 128 pp. 1983. 0-207-14437-0.
• Wall F (1921). Ophidia Taprobanica or the Snakes of Ceylon. Colombo, Ceylon [Sri Lanka]: Colombo Museum. (H.R. Cottle, Government Printer). xxii + 581 pp. (Genus Dendrelaphis, pp. 220–221).

External links

• • Video of Dendrelaphis kopsteini in Malaysia

Notes and References

1. Mallik . Ashok Kumar . Achyuthan . N. Srikanthan . Ganesh . Sumaithangi R. . Pal . Saunak P. . Vijayakumar . S. P. . Shanker . Kartik . 27 July 2019 . Discovery of a deeply divergent new lineage of vine snake (Colubridae: Ahaetuliinae: Proahaetulla gen. nov.) from the southern Western Ghats of Peninsular India with a revised key for Ahaetuliinae . . en . 14 . 7 . e0218851 . 10.1371/journal.pone.0218851 . 31314800 . 6636718 . 1932-6203 . 2019PLoSO..1418851M . free.
2. Book: Wallach, V. . Van Wallach . Williams, K.L. . Kenneth L. Williams . Boundy, J. . species:Jeff Boundy . 2014 . Snakes of the World: A Catalogue of Living and Extinct Species . Boca Raton, Florida . CRC Press . 978-1-4822-0847-4.
3. van Rooijen, J. . species:Johan van Rooijen . Vogel, G. . species:Gernot Vogel . Somaweera, R. . species:Ruchira Somaweera . 2015 . A revised taxonomy of the Australo-Papuan species of the colubrid genus Dendrelaphis (Serpentes: Colubridae) . Salamandra . 51 . 1 . 33–56 .
4. Vogel, G. . Van Rooijen, J. . 2011 . Contributions to a review of the Dendrelaphis pictus (Gmelin, 1789) complex (Serpentes: Colubridae) – 3. The Indian forms, with the description of a new species from the Western Ghats . Journal of Herpetology . 45 . 1 . 100–110 . 10.1670/09-035.1. 85867473 .
5. Book: Boulenger, G.A. . George Albert Boulenger . 1890 . Reptilia and Batrachia: The Fauna of British India Including Ceylon and Burma . Taylor and Francis . London . Genus Dendrophis . https://archive.org/details/reptiliabatrachi00bouliala/page/336 . 337–339.
6. Nguyen . Sang Ngoc . species:Sang Ngoc Nguyen . Nguyen . Vu Dang Hoang . species:Vu Dang Hoang Nguyen . Le . Manh Van . species:Manh Van Le . Nguyen . Luan Thanh . species:Luan Thanh Nguyen . Vo . Thi-Dieu-Hien . species:Thi-Dieu-Hien Vo . Vo . Ba Dinh . species:Ba Dinh Vo . Che . Jing . species:Jing Che . Murphy . Robert W. . species:Robert Ward Murphy . 2023 . A new snake of the genus Dendrelaphis Boulenger, 1890 (Squamata: Colubridae) from the coastal area of southern Vietnam . Zootaxa . 5318 . 1 . 130–144 . 10.11646/zootaxa.5318.1.6 . 1175-5334.
7. Lazell, J.D. . species:James D. Lazell, Jr. . 2002 . The herpetofauna of Shek Kwu Chau, South Chinese Sea, with descriptions of two new colubrid snakes . Memoirs of the Hong Kong Natural History Society . 25 . 1–82.
8. Vogel, G. . Van Rooijen, J. . 2011 . Description of a new species of the genus Dendrelaphis Boulenger, 1890 from Myanmar (Squamata: Serpentes: Colubridae) . Bonn Zoological Bulletin . 60 . 1 . 17–24 .