Cnemaspis samanalensis, Mendis Wickramasinghe & Munindradasa, 2007

Mendis Wickramasinghe, L. J. & Munindradasa, D. A. I., 2007, Review of the genus Cnemaspis Strauch, 1887 (Sauria: Gekkonidae) in Sri Lanka with the description of five new species, Zootaxa 1490 (1), pp. 1-63 : 12-14

Cnemaspis samanalensis sp. nov.

Holotype. NMSL 20061501 , Adult male, 36.91 mm SVL, from Samanala upper region, Ratnapura, Sri Lanka, (N 06º 45’ 47.1” E 080º 29’ 30.1”, elevation 1430m), 11.02.2005, collected by L. J. Mendis Wickramasinghe, Mahesh Chathuranga, D A I Munindradasa.

Paratypes, NMSL 20061502 , Adult male, 32.48 mm SVL; NMSL 20061503 , Adult male, 34.37 mm; NMSL 20061504 , Adult female 36.53 mm SVL; NMSL 20061505 , Adult female 36.18 mm SVL, the same date, locality and collectors.

Diagnosis. A medium-sized Cnemaspis (snout to vent length 32–37 mm in an adult males), which can be distinguished from all known congeners by the following combination of characters: postmentals separated by a small scale; nostrils are not in contact with first supralabial; 6–7 supra labials to angle of mid-orbit position and end of jaw at nine supra labials; 32 interorbitals; 3–4 prominent conical tubercles behind ear; throat scales keels; dorsal tubercles 62–64; dorsal tubercles small, rounded, pentagonal or hexagonal; intermixed with small groups of large tubercles (4–6 in a cluster) at the mid region of the body; lower part of flank with spinelike tubercles; upper part of flank with subconical-trihedral scales; gular scales keels; midventrals 32; ventral keels and imbricate; mid subcaudals small; 3–4 preanal pores; 3–4 femoral pores on each side; 11–12 subdigital lamellae and 4–5 basal lamellae in the 4 th finger; 12–13 subdigital lamellae and 7 basal lamellae in the 4 th toe.

Description of Holotype. Adult male (figs. 6, 15A, 19A, 23A, 27A and 31A) snout to vent length 36.91 mm, head depressed and narrow (HD / HL 0.37), head elongated and large (HLJ / SVL 0.27), distinct from the neck. Snout long (SE / HW 0.73), longer than the eye width (EW / SE 0.39). Eye relatively large (EW / HLJ 0.18). Ear opening small (EL / HLJ 0.03), inter ear distance is greater than the width of the eye (EE / EW 3.27).

Rostral is large with a groove penetrating 3/4 of the scale. There are three internasals, with the mid scale being large in size to the nostril, and the other two are larger. The supranasal and postnasal consist of one smooth circular scale each and are bigger than the nostril, but smaller than internasal and larger than the mid one. The head is covered with elongated, round, pentagonal or hexagonal shaped tubercle scales from snout to posterior margin of interorbital area and with small granulated scales up to the neck. The size of tubercle scales becomes progressively smaller from the snout to interorbital area. Similar sized scales are located in the upper and lower interorbital areas and, in the parietal area. There are 32 interorbital scales of which mid scales are shorter and smaller than that of outer. The supraciliaries are extremely larger than upper interorbital scales. The nostril is oval, and is not connected with the supralabials. The nostril and the first supralabial are separated by a postnasal. The loreal region is convex and is covered with 15 large, circular or elongated, smooth tubercle scales. There are nine supralabials at the base of the jaw, with six at the mid orbit point. The first, second, third and forth supralabials are usually equal. The rest becomes progressively small. The dorsal tubercles are smaller than the upper interorbitals and are rounded, pentagonal or hexagonal in shape, and are different in size. There are 64 dorsal tubercles, intermixed with small groups (4–6 in a cluster) of large, slightly carinated tubercles at the mid region of the body. The spine-like tubercles present on the lower part of flank are well prominent and larger than dorsal body scales and the subconical-trihedral scales present on the upper part of flank are slightly smaller than the above. The dorsal part of forelimb and hind limb is covered with flushed, comparatively large scales with a keel. The dorsal tail is covered with larger intermixed carinated and conical tubercles. The dorsal tail possesses a diminished grove. Two spine-like tubercles are present at the base of the tail. The mental scale is large and sub-triangular. A pair of pentagonal or hexagonal postmentals (smaller than the mental) is present on either side. The first postmental pair is separated by a small scale, and is connected with the first infralabial. The second postmental pair is smaller, and is connected with the first and second infralabials. There are eight infralabials towards the jaw end, with six of them towards the mid orbit point. The infralabials become progressively smaller in size towards the anterior end. The ear holes are oval shaped, bigger than nostrils, but smaller than eyes. Prominent 3–4 conical tubercles are present behind the ear. There are 20 scales between the eye and ear. The scales in the throat are having keels, rounded, pentagonal or hexagonal in shape, the anterior scales being larger than the posterior scales. The gular scales are having keels. The mid ventral area consists of 32 scales with keels, which are smaller than the postmentals. The scales in ventral portion of fore and hind limbs are having keels, with the scales in the hind limb being relatively larger than those of the forelimb. There are three femoral pores and three preanal pores present. The preanal are slightly larger than anal scales. There are 77 subcaudals. The mid subcaudals are equal in size with other scales in the tail. The mid subcaudals are elongated-overlapping-diamond in shape. The keels are present in subcaudals. The digits are slender, elongated and clawed. The distal sub-digital formulae include 4>3>5>2>1 (fingers) and 4>3>5>2>1 (toes) ( Fig.27.A .).

Colour in life. The body colour in the dorsal side is blackish brown. There is a yellow transverse band of which the anterior margin is black, on either upper interorbital area. A dark ‘W’ shaped marking with yellow bands on either arm is present in the anterior parietal area. A faded black ‘V’ shaped marking is present, originating from two angles of the ‘W’. A dark ‘W’ with a yellow patch penetrating in the middle, is present on the anterior neck. The supraciliaries are brown with yellow spots. The eye pupil is circular and black with the surrounding being yellow. The lateral view of the head and neck consists of three faded black line segments (one from nasal to mid eye in loreal region, the other along lower parietal and the third from back of eye to neck on temporal region) in a brown background with white spots in supralabial, lower jaw and lower neck areas. The ventral view of the throat is light grey with irregular yellow markings in ventral jaw. There are two segmented stripe on upper arm and three on lower arm of light brown in colour, in a brown background. The yellow stripe formula of 2,2,4,4 and 2 is present on fingers in a dark brown background. The ventral view of lower and upper arm is grey. The mid dorsal area of the body is dark brown, with an inverted heart-shaped and three hat-shaped white markings having a yellow tip each, between fore and hind limbs. There is a diminished dumbbell of white between fore limbs while diminished black ‘W’ between hind limbs with a white boarder. The white and yellow spots are present in the flank in mid lateral view. The mid ventral view is grey in colour. There are two segmented stripes on each femur and three on tibia of yellow in colour, in a dark brown background. The yellow stripe formula of 2,3,4,5 and 4 is present on toes in a dark brown background. The ventral femur and tibia is grey in colour with light brown scale boundaries. The original part of the tail is dark brown, with 11 transverse marks of white, of which the mark at the base is hat shaped with a yellow tip. The ventral tail is grey.

Colour in alcohol. All dark brown in life is turned in to light brown, diminished black has become prominent and yellow has turned in to white while the rest is conserved.

Etymology. The species epithet samanalensis is derived from the Latin for “Samanala region” referring to the forest where the species nov. is discovered. The vernacular names assigned for the species nov. are Samanala kandu diva huna, Sivanolipathamalai pahal palli and Samanala day gecko in native languages Sinhala, Tamil and in English respectively.

Remarks. C. samanalensis sp. nov. is congener with C. tropidogaster from morphological characters. However, C. samanalensis can easily be distinguished from C. tropidogaster by the SVL, presence of prominent conical tubercles (3–4) behind ear, presence of groups of large tubercles in clusters (4–6 in a cluster) in dorsal body, presence of well prominent spine-like tubercles on flank, the intraorbital, dorsal tubercle and ventral counts, and also from morphometric analysis.

Figures

FIGURE 27. The ventral view of the hand, foot and tail of, A. C. samanalensis sp. nov. 36.91 mm SVL (NMSL20061501) and B. C. tropidogaster 32.64 mm SVL (NMSL2004.11.1).