Elseya uberrima explained

Elseya uberrima is a Pliocene species of extinct Australian snapping turtle.

Taxonomy

During his time at the Queensland Museum, Charles Walter De Vis described a number of fossil turtles from the Darling Downs region of Queensland, Australia.^[1] All four species described were declared a single diagnosable species by Thomson, 2000.

To avoid confusion the synonymy for the species is as follows:

• Elseya uberrima (De Vis, 1897^[2])
  • Chelymys uberrima De Vis, 1897: 3
  • Chelymys antiqua De Vis 1897: 4
  • Chelymys arata De Vis 1897: 5
  • Pelocomastes ampla De Vis 1897: 6–7

This synonymy has made the genus name Pelocomastes a junior synonym of Elseya and in their recent revision of that genus Thomson et al. (2015)^[3] resurrected Pelocomastes as a subgenus to represent the Queensland clade of the Elseya. Therefore, Elseya (Pelocomastes) uberrima is the type species for this subgenus.

frame|center|middle|alt=A) Lectotype of Elseya uberrima; B) Lectotype of Elseya arata; C-D) dorsal and ventral views of the lectotype of Pelocomastes ampla.|A) Lectotype of Elseya uberrima; B) lectotype of Elseya arata; C-D) dorsal and ventral views of the lectotype of Pelocomastes ampla.

Notes and References

1. Thomson SA. 2000. A Revision of the Fossil Chelid Turtles (Pleurodira) Described by C.W. De Vis, 1897. Memoirs of the Queensland Museum 45 (2): 593–598. (Brisbane).
2. De Vis CW. 1897. The extinct freshwater turtles of Queensland. Annals of the Queensland Museum 3: 3–7.
3. Thomson, S., Amepou, Y., Anamiato, J. & Georges, A. 2015. A new species and subgenus of Elseya (Testudines: Pleurodira: Chelidae) from New Guinea. Zootaxa 4006(1):59–82. Preview (PDF)