The snake genus Oligodon, known for its egg-eating feeding behaviour, is a taxonomically and systematically challenging group from South and Southeast Asia. This work provides the first phylogenetic hypothesis for the genus, and includes a checklist and key to the species. I use approximately 1900 base pairs of mitochondrial DNA sequence data to infer the relationships of these snakes, and I examine congruence between the molecular phylogeny and hemipenial characters. A hypothesis for the position of Oligodon within the Colubridae is also proposed. I discuss the implications of the phylogeny for previous taxonomic groupings, and consider the usefulness of the trees in analysis of behaviour and biogeography.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:TORONTO/oai:tspace.library.utoronto.ca:1807/24575 |
| Date | 26 July 2010 |
| Creators | Green, Marc |
| Contributors | Murphy, Robert W. |
| Source Sets | University of Toronto |
| Language | en_ca |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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