Snake Found New Chameleon Species

A new chameleon, Kinyongia magomberae, was discovered after a researcher ran across a twig snake that regurgitated the lizard. (News source.)

New Lungless Caecilian

A new species of caecilian, Caecilita iwokramae, has been determined to be lungless. While not the first such caecilian, apparently it is distinctly different from the other lungless caecilian. (News source.)

Peruvian Frogs

Some interesting new frogs from high in the Andes, here.

Sherando Salamander Research

A Washington and Lee University professor and his students are trying to determine if the Sherando salamander in the George Washington National Forest is actually a distinct species. (News source.)

More on the New Georgia Salamander

The recently described "patch-nosed salamander" is pictured here, and one of the researchers who described it is profiled here.

India: New Gecko

A new gecko, Cnemasspis kolhapurensis, has been described from India. (News source and image.)

Horned Lizard Species

The coast horned lizard in California, Phrynosoma coronatum, has been split into three species. (Eurekalert.)

New Varanus from Indonesia

Varanus lirungensis has been described from the Talaud Islands in Indonesia. (News source.)

New US Salamander

A tiny new salamander has been discovered in the Appalachians. It has been named Urspelerpes brucei. (News source.)

A new genus and species of lungless salamander (family Plethodontidae) from the Appalachian highlands of the south-eastern United States
C. D. Camp, W. E. Peterman, J. R. Milanovich, T. Lamb, J. C. Maerz, D. B. Wake
Journal of Zoology
Published Online: Jun 22 2009 12:04PM

New Species

New species described in Zootaxa:

A casque-headed tree frog from Brazil
Two shrub frogs from Sri Lanka
Rediscovery of a toad in Bolivia/Peru
A gecko from the Nicobar Archipelago
A bent-toed gecko from Indonesia
An Atheris viper from Mozambique

New Frogs from Madagascar

Details here on almost 200 new frogs identified from Madagascar.

Lizard News

A new chameleon has been described from Tanzania. (News source.)

Lizards sunbathe for both warmth and vitamin D regulation. (News source.)

New Vietnam Species

A new pitviper, lizard, toad, and burrowing snake have been discovered.

Tiny Andean Frog

Noble's pygmy frog, discovered in the Andes, can sit on a dime with ease. (News source.)

Diplodactylus

In the Australian genus of geckos, Diplodactylus, one species has been discovered to be eight separate species from genetic research. (News source.)

New Species from Zootaxa

Some new or redescribed herps from Zootaxa:

A new colubrid from the genus Pareas from China.

An earth-snake (Atractus wagleri) from Colombia is redescribed.

From Guyana comes a new genus and species of lizard (Pantepuisaurus rodriguesi).

A new gecko, Gymnodactylus vanzolinii, is described from Brazil.

Two new agamids (Acanthosaura) are described from Malaysia.

A new microteiid was found in Brazil.

New Skink, New Caledonia

Kanakysaurus zebratus is a new species of skink discovered on the northwest coast of Grande Terre, New Caledonia. (Abstract)

India: New Frogs

12 new frogs will be described soon from India. (News source.)

Columbia: New Herps

Ten new amphibians have been discovered in Columbia. Nat Geo has pics of several.

Amphibians

A new (strange-looking) toad found in Tanzania, pictured here.

Researchers are looking at a compound in tadpoles as a potential resource to prevent skin cancer. (News source.)

New Galapagos Iguana

The "rosada," a Galapagos land iguana from Isabela, has been designated a new species. (News source.)

New Herps from Tanzania

17 species of reptiles and amphibians have been discovered in the South Nguru Mountains in Tanzania. (News source.)

New (Strange) Frog

A newly described Cambodian bush frog has green blood and turquoise bones. Biliverdin (metabolic waste usually processed in the liver) passes into the bloodstream, which may help with camouflage (the skin being translucent) and also might make the frog unpalatable to predators. (News source.)

Splitting the Dwarf Croc

Researchers now believe that the two separate subspecies of African dwarf crocodiles are distinct species, and that there is another, as yet unnamed, species. (Eurekalert)

Two New Geckos

Two new geckos have been found in Australia. (News source.)

New Herps

A few new species from the last month at Zootaxa:

Two new Cyrtodactylus geckos from Vietnam.
A new frog (Oreobates) from the Andes of Argentina.
A new lizard (Arthrosaura) from from Brazil/Guyana.
A new frog (Nyctibatrachus) from India.

Glassfrogs Described

Seven new glassfrogs have been described from Ecuador. (News source.)

Legless Lizard Described

The description for a new Brazilian legless lizard has been published in Zootaxa. (News source.)

New Herps from Zootaxa, September 2008

The papers aren't accessible (subscription required), but you can view the pdf abstracts.

1) A new frog, Adelophryne patamona, is described from Guyana.
2) A new skink, Oligosoma pikitanga, is described from New Zealand.
3) A new lizard, Bachia oxyrhina, is described from Brazil.
4) A new gecko, Cnemaspis biocellata, is described from Thailand/Malaysia.
5) A new lizard, Scriptosaura catimbau, is described from Brazil.
6) A new lizard, Leptodactylus cupreus, is described from Brazil.

Also, chromosomal analysis of some frogs (Pristimantis spp.) from Brazil suggests an undescribed species. And, there's a paper on foam-generating tadpoles.

New Iguana from Fiji

The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B has published the description of a new species of iguana (Brachylophus bulabula) from Ovalau Island, Fiji. (News source.)

Follow-Up: Barbados Threadsnake

"Clearing the air" on the description of the tiny threadsnake.

Snake Description Makes Waves

Some Barbados residents are upset that someone from outside their country came in and named a tiny thread snake after his wife. (News source.)

New Species from Vietnam

Two new geckos and a pit viper have been discovered in Vietnam. (News source.)

Smallest Snake?

A tiny threadsnake found on Barbados might be the smallest snake yet discovered. (News source.)

New Toad in Ecuador

From Zootaxa:

A new species of Osornophryne (Anura: Bufonidae) from the Andean highlands of northern Ecuador
Andrew G. Gluesenkamp (USA) & Juan M. Guayasamin (Ecuador)
Zootaxa 1828: 18-28 (23 Jul. 2008) 5 plates; 15 references
Abstract here.

New Frog

The Southern Sandhill Frog is a new species in Australia, distinguished from the Northern species. (News source.)

New Gecko

A new species is being described in the news as the largest gecko yet found in India, at 250 mm. (I'm a bit leery of this claim; the Tokay gecko, for example, is found in northern India, and can surpass that length in at least parts of its wide range.) The new species has been named Hemidactylus aaronbaueri, after lizard expert Dr. Aaron Bauer of Villanova. (Dr. Bauer, of course, should be a familiar name, as he has written on the cryptozoological giant gecko and other unusual cases.) The lizard was first photographed two years ago, and the photos forwarded to the Bombay Natural History Society for identification, where they realized it was a new species. Since then, about 20 more have been found on rocky cliffs in north west Ghats. (News source.)

Gomeran Skink Described

Genetic research shows that the skink on La Gomera (Canary Islands) is an endemic species, not just a subspecies. (News source.)

New Reptiles

A few new species of snakes and lizards described in the last couple months:

A pitviper from Hon Son Island in Vietnam, Cryptelytrops honsonensis. (Zootaxa)
A xenodermatid snake from Vietnam, Fimbrios smithi. (Zootaxa)
A night-lizard from Mexico, Lepidophyma cuicateca. (Zootaxa)
Two geckos from southern Vietnam, Cyrtodactylus takouensis and Cyrtodactylus huynhi. (Zootaxa)
A gecko from Borneo in the genus Luperosaurus. (Zootaxa)
A gecko from Cuba, Tarentola crombiei. (Zootaxa)
A gecko from Thailand, Gekko nutaphandi. (Zootaxa)

Two Recently Described Snakes

Two interesting snakes have been described recently in Zootaxa.

The first is a new species of false water cobra, called Hydrodynastes melanogigas. (At present, I've only seen the abstract, not the full paper.) From the abstract:

"A new species of Hydrodynastes is described from the State of Tocantins, Central Brazil. The new species is distinguished from all congeners by having a melanistic color pattern, with head and dorsum of the body mostly dark-brown to black; absence of postocular stripe; venter grayish-brown, with dark rounded blotches outlining two lateral stripes which become gradually paler towards the posterior region of the belly, disappearing after midbody."

The second is a species of Pseudoboa, a group of nocturnal prey-constricting colubrids. Pseudoboa martinsi is a "brightly colored species" in the Amazon basin of Brazil. (abstract)

New North American Frog

A recent study has described a new species, the Cajun chorus frog, Pseudacris fouquettei, from "Louisiana, Arkansas, western Mississippi, eastern Texas and Oklahoma and far southern Missouri." (News source.) (Color photo.) (Description abstract.)

New Skinks

13 new snake-eyed skinks have been discovered in Australia, primarily through genetic differentiation -- though a few are morphologically distinctive. (News source.)

Frog Stories

A new shrub frog, called Philautus ochlandrae, has been described in the Western Ghats, Kerala, India. (News source.)

A dog in Hawaii may have died as the result of a poison-arrow frog encounter. Experts are uncertain, as the Hawaiian invasive shouldn't be as toxic as in its native habitat, but the dog might have been allergic. (News source.)

New Geckos

Four new geckos in the genus Cnemaspis have been described from Vietnam. (News source.)

New Anoles

A 2006 expedition to Serrania de Tabasara, in the Panamanian highlands, found four new anole species. The expedition found a new salamander and two more new anoles closer to to Costa Rica in the western highlands of Cordillera Central. (News source.)

More Salamanders

Three more salamanders (two Bolitoglossa and one Nototriton) have been discovered in La Amistad National Park, Costa Rica. They will be described later. (News source.)

New Gecko

A new gecko from Vietnam has been described: Cyrtodactylus pseudoquadrivirgatus. (News source.)

New Giant Spitting Cobra

A new species of "giant" spitting cobra was described from Kenya. Naja ashei reaches almost nine feet in length. The late James Ashe, founder of the Bio-Ken snake farm, first caught the snake in the 1960s, and suggested it was a new species. (News source.)

India: New Caecilian

A new species of caecilian was discovered in Mahadayi Wildlife Sanctuary in the Western Ghats region of India. (news source.)

New Pit Viper?

A three-member team in India appears to have discovered a new species of viper in Arunachal Pradesh. Genetic testing is in progress. (News source.)

Small Frog in India (But Not World's Smallest)

A small frog that ranges up to 14mm in length has been described from India. The species, Nyctibatrachus minimus, is described in Current Science. (News source.)

Also, another specimen of the endangered golden gecko (Calodactylodes sp.) has been discovered in India. (News source.)

New Snake in Vietnam

A new species of snake, a white-lipped keelback, is among a variety of new species discovered in Vietnam's Annamite mountain range. (News source.)

Thailand Lizards

A new gecko and skink are reported from Thailand's northern province of Chiang Mai. (News source.)

New Salamanders

Two new species of salamander have been discovered and described, from Panama. (News source.)

New Golden Frog

A new golden dart frog has been discovered, endemic to "a 20 hectare area in Colombia’s Cundinamarca region." It was discovered by a group of youth under the Conservation Leadership Programme. Doesn't look like it has been scientifically described yet, but they are calling it the "golden frog of Supatá." (News source.)

Vietnam: New Species

Researchers report five new snakes and five new lizards from Phong Nha – Ke Bang National Park in Quang Binh province, Vietnam. Several of these are unique to the park. (News source.)

Suriname New Species

Twenty four new species of animals were discovered in Suriname rain forests following an expedition and follow-up survey. One is a brightly marked Atelopus toad which may be a new species. (News source with photo.)

India: New Legless Lizard

Scientists in Orissa, India, are reporting the discovery of a new legless skink in the genus Sepsophis. It was found in the Khandadhar hills. Other rare species have been discovered in the region, including a new species of Boiga (cat-eyed snake). (News source.)