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RE: Naja ashei

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Posted by: WW at Mon Feb 11 16:57:50 2008   [ Email Message ] [ Show All Posts by WW ]  
   

A few comments on this:

1. The pics look like real N. ashei, not like brown aberrant N. nigricollis from Tanzania. Check the ventral coloration at midbody and further back - usually very dark in nigricollis.

2. Although N. ashei has not been recorded from Tanzania, it would not be too surprising to find it there, esp. along the northeastern border with Kenya.

3. Tanzanian brownish nigricollis don't really look like ashei, more like light-headed and necked nigricollis.

4. The status of crawshayi is open to question. We had a specimen from Zambia that (in terms of DNA) stood out from all other nigricollis, but brown-headed nigricollis from eastern Tanzania group with other black East African nigricollis.

5. However, to make things complicated, there are additional brown spitter populations (currently in nigricollis) from further West than ashei - western Uganda, SW Sudan, NE DRC. These normally have lower ventral scale counts than N. ashei - in the 180s rather than well over 190. A ventral scale count from a shed should clarify that. These guys were a major headache when it came to delimiting N. ashei...

Hope this helps.

Cheers,

WW
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