Discovery of a new skink of the genus Scincella Mittleman, 1950 (Squamata, Scincidae) from Guizhou Province, China

By

Xu, Yuhao
Weng, Shiyang
Poyarkov, Nikolay
Zhang, Tierui
Li, Zeyu
Deng, Jundong
Peng, Lifang

Type

Article

Date of Publication

2025-8-13

Original Publication

Zoosystematics and evolution

Volume

101

Series / Issue

Issue: 4

Pages

1495--1511

Subjects

molecular phylogeny , morphological characters , Scincella qianica sp. nov. , taxonomy

Contributed by

Pensoft Publishers

Language

English

Published by

Sofia Pensoft

Identifiers

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/zse.101.157713

 

Abstract

Scincella potanini was long considered the only species of the genus Scincella recorded in Guizhou Province, China. This study describes a new species of the genus Scincella, Scincella qianicasp. nov., from Guizhou, China, based on an integrative taxonomic approach combining molecular and morphological data. The new species can be distinguished from all known congeners by the following combination of morphological characters: (1) medium body size in adults (SVL length up to 44.8 mm); (2) tail relatively long, TAL/SVL ratio 1.76–2.14 in original tail specimens; (3) toes not in contact with fingers when limbs adpressed; (4) infralabials six to seven; (5) supraciliaries six, rarely seven; (6) tympanum deeply sunk, without lobules; (7) primary temporal one; (8) three pairs of nuchals; (9) midbody scale row counts 26; (10) paravertebral scale row counts 61–66; (11) ventral scale row counts 46–53; (12) 9–10 enlarged lamellae beneath finger IV, and 13–14 beneath toe IV; (13) dark dorsolateral stripes with relatively straight upper edge, extending from the tip of snout to the end of tail, with 1/2+4+1/2 rows of dorsal scales in the middle; (14) ventral surface covered with discontinuous black longitudinal stripes. In the phylogenetic analyses, the new species was nested within a highly supported lineage, forming a sister taxon with S. alia, and exhibits at least 15.8% genetic divergence from other congeners based on the mitochondrial CO1 gene.