Sahyadriophis Explained

Sahyadriophis is a genus of snakes in the family Colubridae. The genus is endemic to the Western Ghats of India.^[1]

Taxonomy

The genus Sahyadriophis was erected in 2023 with Sahyadriophis uttaraghati as the type species. The Nilgiri keelback, formerly placed in the genus Hebius, was also moved into this genus. Molecular data has recovered Sahyadriophis as the sister taxon to the clade containing Xenochrophis, Fowlea and Atretium, diverging from said clade during the late Oligocene or early Miocene, albeit with poor support.^[2]

Species

Two species are currently placed in this genus:

• Sahyadriophis beddomei (Günther, 1864) – Nilgiri keelback
• Sahyadriophis uttaraghati (Patel, Thackeray, Campbell & Mirza, 2023)

Notes and References

1. Patel . Harshil . Thackeray . Tejas . Campbell . Patrick D. . Mirza . Zeeshan A. . August 2023 . Systematic Assessment of Hebius beddomei (Günther, 1864) (Serpentes: Colubridae: Natricinae) with Description of a New Genus and a New Allied Species from the Western Ghats, India . Taxonomy . en . 3 . 3 . 415–434 . 10.3390/taxonomy3030024 . 2673-6500 . free .
2. Deepak . V . Cooper . Natalie . Poyarkov . Nikolay A . Kraus . Fred . Burin . Gustavo . Das . Abhijit . Narayanan . Surya . Streicher . Jeffrey W . Smith . Sarah-Jane . Gower . David J . 2021-11-30 . Multilocus phylogeny, natural history traits and classification of natricine snakes (Serpentes: Natricinae) . Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society . 195 . 1 . 279–298 . 10.1093/zoolinnean/zlab099 . 0024-4082.