Philothamnus girardi Bocage, 1893

Sánchez-Vialas, Alberto, Calvo-Revuelta, Marta & Riva, Ignacio De La, 2022, Synopsis of the terrestrial Reptiles of Equatorial Guinea, Zootaxa 5202 (1), pp. 1-197 : 77-78

Philothamnus girardi Bocage, 1893

Figure 19A

Philothamnus girardi Bocage, 1893a: 46 . Type locality: “Anno Bom Island, Guinea ”. Annobon, Equatorial Guinea.

Distribution. Endemic to Annobon ( Bocage, 1893 a,b; Loveridge 1958; Jesus et al. 2009) ( Map 21C ).

Comments. Philothamnus girardi could probably be a junior synonym of P. dorsalis ( Bocage, 1866a) ( Engelbrecht et al. 2019) . However, as previously reported ( Loveridge 1958), all the specimens from Annobon examined by us have 13 scale rows at mid-body, instead of the 15 rows shown by P. dorsalis ( Chippaux & Jackson 2019) . Philothamnus girardi has been treated by some authors as a subspecies of P. semivariegatus (Mertens 1934; Loveridge 1958), although this last taxon does not form a monophyletic unit and is not closely related to P. girardi (see Engelbrecht et al. 2019). Philothamnus thomensis from São Tomé Island is the sister species to the clade formed by P. girardi and P. dorsalis ( Engelbrecht et al. 2019) .

Specimens examined. Fourteen specimens. Equatorial Guinea (without specific locality), November 1987 ( EBD 27758) . Annobon: Annobon, 1959 [ MNCN 15834 , MNCN 23167 (2 specimens)], 22 November 1987 ( EBD 27762) ; San Antonio , Annobon, 19 November, 1987 (EBD 27766, EBD 27757) ; Annobon airport, 25 November 1987 ( EBD 27769–27772 ) ; San Pedro, Annobon, 11 November 1987 ( EBD 27759) ; San Juan , Annobon ( EBD 27760–27761 ) .

Figures

FIGURE 19. From left to right: lateral, dorsal and ventral views of the head of: Philothamnus girardi (A) (EBD 27758), Philothamnus heterodermus (B) (MNCN 22864), and Philothamnus nitidus (C) (EBD 27534). Photos: AS-V.

MAPS 21 A–C. Distribution maps for Equatorial Guinean records of (A) Hapsidophrys smaragdina; (B) Philothamnus carinatus; (C) Philothamnus girardi.