Bolitoglossa occidentalis Taylor, 1941

Class: Amphibia > Order: Caudata > Family: Plethodontidae > Subfamily: Hemidactyliinae > Genus: Bolitoglossa > Species: Bolitoglossa occidentalis

Bolitoglossa occidentalis Taylor, 1941, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 27: 145. Holotype: USNM 111085, by original designation. Type locality: "La Esperanza [near Escuintla], Chiapas, Mexico, elevation 500 feet". Tighe, 2022, Smithson. Contrib. Zool., 654: 23–24, noted the current location of paratypes.

Bolitoglossa bilineata Lynch and Smith, 1966, Trans. Kansas Acad. Sci., 69: 59. Holotype: UIMNH 56162, by original designation. Type locality: "Sierra Madre north of Zanatepec, Oaxaca, Mexico". Secondary homonym of Bolitoglossa bilineata Duméril, Bibron, and Duméril, 1854, Erp. Gen., 9: 91 (= Eurycea bislineata bislineata). Synonymy by Wake and Brame, 1969, Contrib. Sci. Nat. Hist. Mus. Los Angeles Co., 175: 28.

Bolitoglossa (Nanotriton) occidentalisParra-Olea, García-París, and Wake, 2004, Biol. J. Linn. Soc., 81: 335.

English Names

Southern Banana Salamander (Liner, 1994, Herpetol. Circ., 23: 10; Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 30; Liner and Casas-Andreu, 2008, Herpetol. Circ., 38: 29).

La Esperanza Banana Salamander (Raffaëlli, 2022, Salamanders & Newts of the World: 670).

Distribution

Pacific slopes of southeastern Oaxaca and Chiapas, Mexico, southern Guatemala; also on the Atlantic versant in west-central Chiapas, Mexico, sea level to 2000 m elevation.

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: Guatemala, Mexico

Comment

In the Bolitoglossa rufescens group, which now constitutes part of the subgenus Nanotriton according to Parra-Olea, García-París, and Wake, 2004, Biol. J. Linn. Soc., 81: 336. See account by McCranie and Wilson, 2002, Amph. Honduras: 124–126, who discuss literature and evidence supporting the existence of multiple species under this name. McCranie, 2007, Herpetol. Rev., 38: 36, summarized the departmental distribution in Honduras. Campbell, Smith, Streicher, Acevedo, and Brodie, 2010, Misc. Publ. Mus. Zool. Univ. Michigan, 200: 40, confirmed the distinctivenes of this species from Bolitoglossa rufescens and named species previously confused with this duo. Rovito, Parra-Olea, Vázquez-Almazán, Luna-Reyes, and Wake, 2012, BMC Evol. Biol., 12(255): 1–16, reported on molecular phylogeography. Köhler, 2011, Amph. Cent. Am.: 40–69, compared this species with others from Central America and provided a map and photograph. Raffaëlli, 2013, Urodeles du Monde, 2nd ed.: 315, provided a brief account, photograph, and map. Hess, Itgen, Firneno, Nifong, and Townsend, 2017, J. Zool. Syst. Evol. Res., 55: 150–155, suggested that previous records from Honduras are identifiable as Bolitoglossa nympha. Raffaëlli, 2022, Salamanders & Newts of the World: 670–671, provided an account summarizing systematics, life history, population status, and distribution (including a polygon map). 

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