Eumeces schneiderii ( Daudin, 1802 )

Šmíd, Jiří, Moravec, Jiří, Kodym, Petr, Kratochvíl, Lukáš, Yousefkhani, Seyyed Saeed Hosseinian, Rastegar-Pouyani, Eskandar & Frynta, Daniel, 2014, Annotated checklist and distribution of the lizards of Iran, Zootaxa 3855 (1), pp. 1-97 : 44-45

Eumeces schneiderii ( Daudin, 1802)

HOLOTYPE. Formerly in the MNHN collection, apparently lost (missing from the catalogue); Holotype of E. s. princeps probably in Moscow, collection number unknown ( Taylor 1935; Anderson 1999); Lectotype ZIL 9339 (E. s. zarudnyi ), designated by Taylor (1935).

TYPE LOCALITY. Stated by Daudin (1802) in error as “dans les parties les plus chaudes de l'Amérique, sur-tout à la Jamaïque ” [= in warmer parts of America, especially in Jamaica].

Taylor (1935) believed it to be Egypt or Sinai whereas Mertens (1946) considered Cyprus more likely.

DISTRIBUTION. Coastal N Africa from Tunisia to Egypt, S Turkey, Levant, Iraq, N Arabian Peninsula, Transcaucasia, Iran, S Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and NW India.

DISTRIBUTION IN IRAN. Fig. 130 . Most of western and southern Iran in a continuous belt from West Azerbaijan Prov. along the Zagros range through Fars to Sistan and Baluchistan Prov. Also present in the Alborz and Kopet Dagh foothills but absent from the deserts in central and NE Iran .

HABITAT. Grassy or shrubby habitats with loose sandy or clayey soil. It seeks refuge under stones, in heaps of stones or in burrows.

REMARKS. There are two subspecies in Iran, E. s. princeps Eichwald (type locality Talysh Mts., Azerbaijan) in the western and northern part of the country and E. s. zarudnyi Nikolsky (type locality Bazman, Sistan and Baluchistan Prov., Iran) in Sistan and Baluchistan Prov. and adjacent territories. The latter is considered a full species by some authors ( Khan & Khan 1997; Griffith et al. 2000; Masroor 2009). Based on detailed osteological and morphological analyses, Griffith et al. (2000) divided the genus Eumeces into four genera, assigning the schneiderii species group the name Novoeumeces . However, despite the apparent non-monophyly of the former genus Eumeces confirmed later by genetic analyses ( Schmitz et al. 2004), the name Novoeumeces was found to be a junior objective synonym of Eumeces and the schneiderii species group retained its original name ( Schmitz et al. 2004). There are two records of E. blythianus Anderson from SE Iran, a taxon otherwise distributed in Afghanistan and Pakistan and considered a subspecies of E. schneiderii by some (e.g. Minton 1966). The first record comes from western Sistan and Baluchistan Prov. (voucher specimen deposited in the London museum; BMNH 1951.1.6.67), the second one was shown by Khan & Khan (1997) as to be from eastern Sistan and Baluchistan Prov., but the authors did not give any further details on the locality or determination. The London specimen is tentatively depicted in the map of E. schneiderii ( Fig. 130 ). Nevertheless its determination and the status of this taxon in general should be verified.

REFERENCES. Taylor (1935); Mertens (1946); Khan & Khan (1997); Anderson (1999); Schmitz et al. (2004); Masroor (2009); Faizi et al. (2011).

Figures

FIGURES 128–133. 128. Ablepharus pannonicus. 129. Chalcides ocellatus. 130. Eumeces schneiderii. Red symbols represent records of E. s. princeps, blue of E. s. zarudnyi and blue square denotes its type locality, violet question mark indicates dubious data for E. blythianus. 131. Eurylepis taeniolatus. 132. Ophiomorus blanfordii. 133. Ophiomorus brevipes.