Researchers said they have discovered a new endemic snake species in Taiwan for the first time in 84 years, naming it Pareas Atayal after the Atayal Aborigines, who live in the area it was found.
Lin Si-min (林思民), a life sciences professor at National Taiwan Normal University, and student You Chung-wei (游崇瑋) said they observed the snake for a while without knowing that the species had not been documented.
The blunt-headed, black-striped Pareas Atayal did not intrigue You until he came across a similar-looking species in 2006 that he had never seen before.
Research showed that the species was the Formosan slug snake (Pareas formosensis), a species native to Taiwan and discovered by a Japanese academic in 1931, but he found no information about the Pareas Atayal, he said.
He graduated in 2010 and become a member of Lin’s team. They established through DNA testing and extensive examination of different snakes that the Pareas Atayal is a slug snake endemic to Taiwan.
Lin said that the Japanese used to distinguish between the Formosan slug snake and Pareas komaii — another slug snake native to Taiwan — but similarities between the two species prompted them to abolish the distinction and identify both species as Formosan slug snakes.
The Japanese ignored the fact that eyes of the Atayal and Pareas komaii are yellowish, while Formosan slug snakes have red eyes, Lin said.
To be able to scoop out snails from their shells, local slug snakes have a different number of teeth on each side of their mouth and the Atayal slug snake stood out from others with the most asymmetrical bite, You said.
The finding has been published in Zoological Scripta, a bimonthly scientific journal on systematic zoology, Lin said.
The species is not aggressive and nonvenomous, and feeds on slugs and snails, You said.
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