Dopasia buettikoferi (Lidth de Jeude, 1905)

Fukuyama, Ryobu, Fukuyama, Ibuki, Kurita, Takaki, Kojima, Yosuke, Hossman, Mohamad Yazid, Noda, Akihiro & Nishikawa, Kanto, 2021, New herpetofaunal records from Gunung Mulu National Park and its surrounding areas in Borneo, Herpetozoa 34, pp. 89-96 : 89

Dopasia buettikoferi (Lidth de Jeude, 1905) Fig. 3C, D

Specimens examined.

Two males ( SRC 00626 and 00627) were found at the same time from the Summit Trail between Camps 2 and 3 (4°2.53'N, 114°52.70'E, ca. 890 m a.s.l.) in August. One female ( SRC 00632 ) was also found from the same area (4°2.42'N, 114°52.83'E, ca. 990 m a.s.l.) during the same survey .

Ecological notes.

The males were found on the dipterocarp forest floor at 1525 h. The larger male [147 mm in snout-vent length (SVL) and 447 mm in tail length (TL)] violently bit the dorsal part of the smaller male’s nape (145 mm in SVL and 432 mm in TL) and wound itself around the smaller male, while the smaller twisted its body to escape. This behavior was considered a male-male agonistic interaction. The smaller male had scars resulting from the biting on its lower jaw, nape, and anterior part of the body, and the ventral side of the tail (Suppl. material 1). The larger male also had some scars on the head. The female specimen was found on the trail of dipterocarp forest at 1256 h in a sunny location.

Distribution in Borneo.

This species has been recorded from 11 localities across western and northern Borneo (ca. 230-1300 m a.s.l.) ( Jablonski et al. 2020).

Remarks.

The first and second specimens had different colors from the third specimen. Colorations of the first and second specimens were similar to the first individual of Jablonski et al. (2020): the dorsum was reddish-brown interspaced by several blue dots and the ventral side was uniformly yellow. On the other hand, the third individual was similar to those reported by Jablonski et al. (2020): it consists of dark-colored subocular stripes together with other stripes on the head bordered by light-colored margins. Although Jablonski et al. (2020) hypothesized that the former type would be a cryptic species, the two morphotypes in our specimens had an identical haplotype for the mitochondrial ND2 gene (1098 bp; accession numbers LC600804 and LC600805 for SRC 00626 and 00632, respectively), suggesting that they are the same species.

Figures

Figure 3. Newly recorded amphibian and lizards from the Mulu area. A. Ingerophrynus quadriporcatus; B. Cyrtodactylus muluensis (SRC 00591); C, D. Male (C; SRC 00627) and female (D.) specimens of Dopasia buettikoferi.