Ovophis anitae
| Ovophis anitae | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Order: | Squamata |
| Suborder: | Serpentes |
| Family: | Viperidae |
| Genus: | Ovophis |
| Species: | O. anitae
|
| Binomial name | |
| Ovophis anitae David, Frétey & Vogel, 2024
| |
Ovophis anitae, or the Pingbian mountain pitviper, is a species of mountain pit viper endemic to China and northern Vietnam.[1] Like all pit vipers, it is venomous.[2] Originally, O. anitae was named Ovophis malhotrae by Zeng et al. (2023), but was renamed as that name was unavailable.[3] Both names are in honour of Dr. Anita Malhotra of Bangor University for her molecular biology work on Asian pitvipers.[4]
Description
Ovophis anitae is a wide, dark brown snake with a triangular head, ~6-6.5 meters long from snout to vent. It has a black marking on each side of its body, it is dark brown dorsally and on the sides of its head, with cream-orange stripes from its eyes towards its neck which contain light brown spots. Its tail shows small white spots on the dorsal side.[4]
The Pingbian mountain pitviper is distinguished from its relative species by various scale morphologies.[4]
References
- ^ Liu, Shuo; Hou, Mian; Mo, Mingzhong; Li, Mei; Li, Biao; Luo, Xiong; Rao, Dingqi; Li, Song (2025-03-06). "A new species of the genus Ovophis Burger in Hoge & Romano-Hoge, 1981 (Serpentes, Viperidae) from southern Yunnan, China". ZooKeys. 1230: 287–302. doi:10.3897/zookeys.1230.142967. ISSN 1313-2970. PMC 11907264.
- ^ "Ovophis anitae". The Reptile Database. Retrieved 2026-03-01.
- ^ David, Patrick; Frétey, Thierry; Vogel, Gernot (2024-10-29). "The status of the nomen "Ovophis malhotrae" (Squamata, Serpentes, Viperidae, Crotalinae)". Bionomina. 38 (1): 55–61. doi:10.11646/bionomina.38.1.5. ISSN 1179-7657.
- ^ a b c Zeng, Yang‐Mei; Li, Ke; Liu, Qin; Wu, Ya‐Yong; Hou, Shao‐Bing; Zhao, Gui‐Gang; Nguyen, Sang Ngoc; Guo, Peng; Shi, Lei (2023). "New insights into the phylogeny and evolution of Chinese Ovophis (Serpentes, Viperidae): Inferred from multilocus data". Zoologica Scripta. 52 (4): 358–369. doi:10.1111/zsc.12589. ISSN 0300-3256.