Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Good sources? Anyone have any ideas on current distribution?

Just wondering what the most reputed avail info states.

Thanx

that broadcast a year or two ago that was filled with in situ information on salvadorri. In this half hour bonanza, you learned all sorts of things about natural history, from the lizard's use in making one drum cover to the fact that pike traps for pigs on the ground don't work well for catching "tree crocodiles." To round out the show, O'Shea treats the onlookers to a small species of python discovered to be a range extension - this is the compensatory act for not producing a single one of the varanids he sought after yet still naming the episode after them.

Joking aside, not much meaningful (long-term) research has been carried out to publication on these lizards. Seemingly, they're not the most apparent of creatures in the wild (see above). This should not seem suprising, since the main regions in which they're found near the ground with any consistency seem to be the United States and Europe. As most of the more detailed information has been derived from captives in this species (still not uncommon for multiple species of Indonesian monitors), base inferences off of those who've had full-cycle success with the species, unless your backyard is New Guinea. I don't know if any specimens have yet been reported from the northern side of the island. Many other varanid species that occur on the southern side are also present on the northern side. Below is a rare green phase croc monitor - I'm still trying to get the aforementioned researcher to base an episode off of this individual.

N/p
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.1 blue spot timor
these lamps make my room hot!!!!

So appearantly the Fly river isnt the chosen territory for salvadorii, eh? But then again, I think that treking through swamp wouldnt make for a very easy documentary.

Yes, its a shame so little is known of their natural history. Wonder how much one of those drums would sell for. hehe

Ive seen the green phase a few times. Its a marvelous creature, and you were lucky to get such a magnificent picture!

cheers

Hi,
V. salvadorii is known from the Fly River deltaic region and farther up its river system as well. It lives mainly in lowland realm, in trees, on the ground, and in the water sometimes too. It is known to both PNG and West Irian (or whatever they call it now - name changes alot)...

There is a as yet unpublished paper on it distribution being published in Europe now, with map by Dr. H.-G. Horn and Dr. S. Sweet.

I wrote a paper on it in Reptiles June 1998 issue that is pretty much a basic overall depiction of this animal - two field studies have been done on this animal, and plenty more needs to be done for this most unusual Varanus = there is a tremendous amount of ethnographic literature pertaining to it and its PNG relatives in "in prep" now...

cheers,
mbayless

How is the distribution accurately documented with no one in the field? Are we relying on the pet trade for all of our information? Am I not mistaken, but there has not even been photographs of the animal taken in its natural habitat? No?

What about the Lake Kamu region and the Western Province?

the data has been collected based on museum specimens that have been collected, all with detailed locality information for each species. Museums will not take in specimens without locality data. There are many specimens which have been deposited in museums across the globe, from the many expeditions and flora and fauna surveys that have gone to New Guinea..

Hi,
Correction Please: There are several 'voucher' specimens of V. salvadorii with no precise locality data, that merely states: "PNG"....for V. salvadorii, that is nebulous; there are reports of V. salvator that say "PNG", and are probably V. salvadorii....and 1 V. salvator that says "Suriname" (= Tegu) and another that says "America" - but as we know, there are breeding populations of V. salvator in America now = in Florida and in S. Texas along the Rio Grande. It would be "interesting" to see what a breeding group of V. salvadorii in Florida would/could do to local fauna!
cheers,
markb

Actually, I have been told, that there are only 28 specimens of V. salavdorii with locality data in all the museums of the world. A very rarely collected lizard in spite of all the expeditions.

Hi,
Shame on you re: no field studies = no field/locality data. There have been since its 1878 discovery, several collections made of this species, and those specimens are deposited into museums around the World, from personal communication reports, and there are photographs of this species in the wild in several books! So, although there have been only two brief field assessments of this species, we do have field records and distribution records for V. salvadorii = one just has to look around carefully, and ask the right people to find these records....I have listed most of these records in my June 1998 Reptiles magazine issue, but of course have several more since then....
cheers,
markb

There are vouchers for the northern coast of western New Guinea (e.g Archbold Expedition), but NO verified records for the Fly River drainage.

Hi Harold,
I have pers. com. to locality of the Fly River deltaic by 1 biologist/1 herpetologist, 'and' some ethnological reports suggestive to V. salvadorii being there as well...
markb

Mark,
No specimen and/or no photograph = zilch.
"I saw"s just don't count in this field.

There were many "I saw"s of Heloderma in Calif. before 1968 (almost all of which we now know were false). I was the first to verify it with a specimen and photo.

Hi Harold,
Mark, No specimen and/or no photograph = zilch.
"I saw"s just don't count in this field.

There were many "I saw"s of Heloderma in Calif. before 1968 (almost all of which we now know were false). I was the first to verify it with a specimen and photo.

< Yes,you were the first to verify with a photo, but Bradley/Deacon, 1966: Copeia:365-366 also stated they had seen Heloderma in California in 1966, but reports of said locality were as early as 1859 (Baird, 1859)- see Beck, 2005:28-29 - so although more difficult to verify, should be considered! Of course a real photograph such as the one you took in 1979 is better proof than "I saw" reports but not necessarily invalid...>
Cheers Harold,
markb

How about a sketch? Haha... Would would have researchers done prior to the emergence of cmaeras!?

I have gotten reports from a local source of a "very large population of V salvadorii in the Fly River Basin."

Norcalherps - how would anyone local here or otherwise know this unless they went to see it themselves, and if they have seen this, then I would love to see proof of it~

As far as sketches of V. salvadorii - I have never seen or heard of any being done on this species, or 'extremely rarely' in other species' accounts.....but there are a few descriptive accounts of monitors in new guinea, often described as 'iguana', 'big lizard', and more interestingly, 'tree crocodile'.... I have similar reports of same from West Africa's highlands - and I am not sure what these are yet....
markb

Not local from here.

I was joking about the sketches. I was just musing to the thought of darwin carrying around a 6MP digi.

Harold,
There are specimens in MCZ from Lake Murray and Kuru, and two in AMNH from Surt Island, all in the Fly drainage.

Thanks Sam. I stand corrected.

I apologize for confusing everyone. When we were talking about northern distribution I meant the SEPIK river. The Fly River of course drains the southern part of the island.

Harold,

That's essentially correct, salvadorii do not extend down the N coast of PNG beyond the mouth of the Sepik, and they are not known from the Sepik basin with the slightly technical exception that there is a record for the SE flank of the Bewani Mtns, on a river that does flow into the Sepik.

SS