Search tool	Example of search string in box	What that means to the database
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	Hyl*	Will find all uses of "Hyl . . ." anywhere in a record: e.g., Hylarana, Hyla, Hylidae, Hylinae, Hylaedactyla.
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	*Hyla	Will find all uses of ". . . hyla" anywhere in a record: e.g., Hyla, Hylidae, Plectrohyla, Ptychadena hylaea, Adenomera hylaedactyla
	Hyla	Will find all records that contain stand-alone uses of Hyla: e.g., Hyla, Hyla arenicolor
Strings of words without quotation marks	Lithobates pipiens	Interprets this as "Lithobates OR pipiens" so will find the union of all records that contain either "Lithobates" or "pipiens": e.g., Lithobates omiltemanus, Hylorana pipiens
Strings of word with quotation marks	"Lithobates pipiens"	Interprets this as "Lithobates AND pipiens" so will return all records that have the character string "Lithobates pipiens" anywhere within a record: e.g., all members of the Lithobates pipiens complex.
AND statement. Means that the results of the search must include both words held together by an AND	Lithobates AND pipiens	Same as "Lithobates pipiens"
OR statement. Means that the results of the search will all records that have either of the terms held together by an OR	Lithobates OR "Costa Rica"	Recovers all records that contain the word "Lithobates" or "Costa Rica": 402 records inasmuch as this will include all records for the entire amphibian fauna of Costa Rica
Combining Boolean operators within the Basic Search box (AND, OR, NOT, quotation marks)	Lithobates AND "Costa Rica" NOT forreri	Recovers only records that contain the word Lithobates AND "Costa Rica", but excludes any record that contains the word "forreri" in any part of the record: 9 records
Printable HELP file

Search tool	Example of search string in box	What that means to the database
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	Hyl*	Will find all uses of "Hyl . . ." anywhere in a record: e.g., Hylarana, Hyla, Hylidae, Hylinae, Hylaedactyla.
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	*Hyla	Will find all uses of ". . . hyla" anywhere in a record: e.g., Hyla, Hylidae, Plectrohyla, Ptychadena hylaea, Adenomera hylaedactyla
Single word	Hyla	Will find all records that contain stand-alone uses of Hyla: e.g., Hyla, Hyla arenicolor
Strings of words without quotation marks	Lithobates pipiens	Interprets this as "Lithobates OR pipiens" so will find the union of all records that contain either "Lithobates" or "pipiens": e.g., Lithobates omiltemanus, Hylorana pipiens
Strings of word with quotation marks	"Lithobates pipiens"	Interprets this as "Lithobates AND pipiens" so will return all records that have the character string "Lithobates pipiens" anywhere within a record: e.g., all members of the Lithobates pipiens complex.
AND statement. Means that the results of the search must include both words held together by an AND	Lithobates AND pipiens	Same as "Lithobates pipiens"
OR statement. Means that the results of the search will all records that have either of the terms held together by an OR	Lithobates OR "Costa Rica"	Recovers all records that contain the word "Lithobates" or "Costa Rica": 402 records inasmuch as this will include all records for the entire amphibian fauna of Costa Rica
Combining Boolean operators within the Basic Search box (AND, OR, NOT, quotation marks)	Lithobates AND "Costa Rica" NOT forreri	Recovers only records that contain the word Lithobates AND "Costa Rica", but excludes any record that contains the word "forreri" in any part of the record: 9 records
Printable HELP file

Uraeotyphlus bombayensis (Taylor, 1960)

Class: Amphibia > Order: Gymnophiona > Family: Ichthyophiidae > Genus: Uraeotyphlus > Species: Uraeotyphlus bombayensis

Ichthyophis bombayensis Taylor, 1960, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 40: 67. Holotype: BMNH 1888.6.11.1, by original designation. Type locality: "Waghii Surrat, Bombay, India" (= Waghii, Surat Dangs, Gujarat, India).

Ichthyophis malabarensis Taylor, 1960, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 40: 80. Holotype: BMNH 1894.3.15.3, by original designation. Type locality: "Maduvangard, Travancore, [state of Kerala,] India". Synonymy by Gower, Dharne, Bhatta, Giri, Vyas, Venu, Oommen, George, Schouche, and Wilkinson, 2007, J. Zool., London, 272: 269.

Ichthyophis peninsularis Taylor, 1960, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 40: 61. Holotype: BMNH 1882.12.12.6, by original designation. Type locality: "Malabar, India". Biju, 2001, Occas. Publ. Indian Soc. Conserv. Biol., 1: 8, noted the imprecision of this type locality. Synonymy by Gower, Dharne, Bhatta, Giri, Vyas, Venu, Oommen, George, Schouche, and Wilkinson, 2007, J. Zool., London, 272: 269.

Ichthyophis subterrestris Taylor, 1960, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 40: 65. Holotype: FMNH 73927, by original designation. Type locality: "Travancore-Cochin [state of Kerala], plains, India". Synonymy by Gower, Dharne, Bhatta, Giri, Vyas, Venu, Oommen, George, Schouche, and Wilkinson, 2007, J. Zool., London, 272: 269.

Uraeotyphlus bombayensis — Dubois, Ohler, and Pyron, 2021, Megataxa, 5: 272, 407.

English Names

Bombay Caecilian (Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 25; Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Gururaja, and Bhatta, 2009, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, Occas. Pap., 302: 129).

Maharashtra Caecilian (Das and Dutta, 1998, Hamadryad, 23: 67).

Travancore Caecilian (Ichthyophis malabarensis [no longer recognized]: Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 25).

Malabar Caecilian (Ichthyophis malabarensis [no longer recognized]: Das and Dutta, 1998, Hamadryad, 23: 67).

Peninsular Caecilian (Ichthyophis peninsularis [no longer recognized]: Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 25).

Kerala Caecilian (Ichthyophis peninsularis [no longer recognized]: Das and Dutta, 1998, Hamadryad, 23: 67).

Pale-bellied Caecilian (Ichthyophis peninsularis [no longer recognized]: Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 82).

Short-headed Caecilian (Ichthyophis peninsularis [no longer recognized]: Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 82).

Cochin Caecilian (Ichthyophis subterrestris [no longer recognized]: Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 25).

Semi-terrestrial Caecilian (Ichthyophis subterrestris [no longer recognized]: Das and Dutta, 1998, Hamadryad, 23: 67).

Lavender-colored Caecilian (Ichthyophis subterrestris [no longer recognized]: Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 84).

Wide Range Unicolour Caecilian (Dinesh, Radhakrishnan, Deepak, and Kulkarni, 2023, Fauna India Checklist, vers. 5.0 : 16).

Distribution

Western Ghats from Gujarat to Kerala and the Eastern Ghats in southern Andhra Pradesh, India.

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: India

Endemic: India

Comment

See accounts by Dutta, 1997, Amph. India Sri Lanka: 25-26 (as Ichthyophis peninsularis and Ichthyophis subterrestris), Bhatta, 1998, J. Biosciences, Bangalore, 23: 73–85, Pillai and Ravichandran, 1999, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, Occas. Pap., 172: 26-27 (as Ichthyophis bombayensis), page 42-48 (as Ichthyophis malabarensis and Ichthyophis peninsularis), and page 52-56 (as Ichthyophis subterrestris); Chanda, 2002, Handb. Indian Amph.: 188, 191-192, 195 (as Ichthyophis bombayensis, Ichthyophis malabarensis, Ichthyophis peninsularis, and Ichthyophis subterrestris); Daniels, 2005, Amph. Peninsular India: 82-86 (as Ichthyophis peninsularis and Ichthyophis subterrestris). Gower, Kupfer, Oommen, Himstedt, Nussbaum, Loader, Presswell, Müller, Krishna, Boistel, and Wilkinson, 2002, Proc. R. Soc. London, Ser. B, Biol. Sci., 269: 1563-1569, suggested that this taxon (as Ichthyophis malabarensis) is the sister taxon of Uraeotyphlidae. Das and Dutta, 2007, Hamadryad, 31: 154–181, noted two larval descriptions in the literature (as Ichthyophis malabaricus, error for Ichthyophis malabarensis). Gower, Dharne, Bhatta, Giri, Vyas, Venu, Oommen, George, Schouche, and Wilkinson, 2007, J. Zool., London, 272: 266-275, reported on the phylogenetics and taxonomy of former Ichthyophis malabarensis, Ichthyophis peninsularis, and Ichthyophis subterrestris. Ganesh and Asokan, 2010, Hamadryad, 35: 46-63, noted specimens (as Ichthyophis peninsularis and Ichthyophis subterrestris) from the Eastern Ghats near Chennai, Andhra Pradesh, India. Das and Dutta, 2007, Hamadryad, 31: 154–181, noted three larval descriptions in the literature, as Ichthyophis monochrous and Ichthyophis peninsularis). Pyron and Wiens, 2011, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol., 61: 543-583 (see comment in Amphibia record) confirmed that Ichthyophis bombayensis is the sister taxon of Uraeotyphlus, suggesting that it warrants a new generic name. A brief characterization, photograph, and dot map for the southern Western Ghats provided by Subramanian, Dinesh, and Radhakrishnan, 2013, Atlas of Endemic Amph. W. Ghats: 179. Sreekumar and Dinesh, 2020, Rec. Zool. Surv. India, 120: 33–40, discussed the range in Maharashtra, India, in terms of agro-climatic zones. Dubois, Ohler, and Pyron, 2021, Megataxa, 5: 272, transferred this species to Ichthyophis to relieve the paraphyly of Uraeotyphlus.

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To search the NIH genetic sequence database, see GenBank
For additional information see AmphibiaWeb report
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For information on distribution, habitat, and conservation see the Map of Life
For related information on conservation and images as well as observations see iNaturalist
For access to available specimen data for this species, from over 350 scientific collections, go to Vertnet.