Bothrocophias
Bothrocophias is a snake genus of the subfamily of pit vipers. The genus occurs with five species in northwestern South America. The snakes are ground alive and live in humid tropical forests from the rain forest of the lowlands to mountain cloud forests. All species are poisonous, the few information on the toxic effects in humans range from mild curves with short -term pain and mild swelling to severe poisoning and occasional deaths.
- 6.1 Notes and references
- 6.2 Literature
Features
Physique
The types of Bothrocophias are medium to large, medium slender to very strong and strong stocky snakes. The large head is sold mainly posterior very broad and clearly from the neck, the snout is rounded to pointed and the eyes are relatively small. The canthus is very sharp and the tip of the snout is variably strong, medium, or not curved upwards depending on the type. The slender tail is not prehensile and of medium length, it accounts for 12 to 18% of the total length. The smallest species (B. hyoprora ) usually reaches total lengths of 40 to 50 cm, up to 83 cm, the largest species (B. colombianus ) reach a maximum of 136 cm.
Squamation
The rostral is as high as or higher than wide. There are three Praeocularia, of which the upper one is significantly larger than the other. The species usually show only a narrow, elongated Suboculare, but occasionally it is also divided into several small scales. The top of the head is covered with small, different sized, smooth or keeled scales. There are 2 to 10 smooth, keeled, or granular Intersupraoculare between the large and relatively wide Supraocularia. The number of supralabials is 7 to 9, the number of Infralabialia 8 to 11 The number of ventral scales ( Ventralschilde ) varies 118-177, the number of divided or undivided Subcaudalia 38-64 and the number of dorsal scale rows in the middle of the body 21 to 25
Coloring
The ground color of the upper side is variable rusty brown, gray-brown, pink or orange tinted, dark brown or almost black. Show on the back of the animals on this reason, a number broad dark transverse bands, which often run triangle- shaped at the sides. In older individuals, this cross- bands may be only very faintly visible. The sides of the head can indicate a striking, bright or dark backgrounds eye stripe ( Postokularstreifen ) or colored predominantly dark. Striking characteristic of the genus are the yellow, white or pale blue-gray spots or dark -rimmed eye-spots on the Infralabialia.
Distribution and habitat
Bothrocophias occurs with five species in the northwest of South America, of which two species live west and three east of the Andes. The distribution area extends from northern Colombia to Bolivia in the middle. The animals live in humid tropical forests there from the rain forest of the lowlands to mountain cloud forests up to a maximum of 2350 m height. The species are not known to all relatively rare.
System
Campbell & Lamar recognize five species are recognized for each no subspecies:
- Bothrocophias campbelli ( Freire - Lascano 1991)
- Bothrocophias colombianus ( Rendahl & Vestergren 1940)
- Bothrocophias hyoprora ( Amaral 1935)
- Bothrocophias microphthalmus ( Cope 1875)
- Bothrocophias myersi Gutberlet & Campbell 2001
The genus was described in 2001, the species of the genus were asked by then most of the American Terciopelos ( genus Bothrops ). The recent molecular genetic studies suggest a monophyly of the genus Bothrocophias, a molecular genetic analysis involving all five species is so far but not before.
Lifestyle, diet, and reproduction
All species are almost exclusively ground alive, information on the time of day activities are so far hardly. After the few is these snakes eat frogs, small lizards and small mammals. All species are viviparous. Reproductive lie far too little before, in one case, 36 embryos were found in females of B. microphthalmus.
Poison
The few data on the toxic effects in humans are not uniform, ranging from light curves with short -term pain and slight swelling of severe poisoning with bleeding disorders, spontaneous bleeding and necrosis up to occasional fatalities.