Variabilidade intraespecífica em neusticurus bicarinatus (linnaeus) (reptilia: squamata: gymnophthalmidae).

Abstract

The genus Neusticurus was discussed by Uzzell (1966) who detected intraspecific variation in scutellation in N. bicarinatus, N. tatei, N. rudis, N. ecpleopus, N. apodemus, N. strangulatus, and N. cochranae. Van Devender (1969) also found varying intraspecific scelation in N. racenisi. Dixon (1981), provided more data on this, describing the holotype of N. medemi. In the interest of contributing to the knowledge of the genus, this project was designed to: (1) analyze the variability in several characteristics of the escutcheon of N. bicarinatus in populations from eastern Pará; (2) compare the data obtained with those from samples from other localities; (3) verify the occurrence or not of allometric growth and/or sexual dimorphism in the body proportions of N. bicarinatus. The study will be based on specimens of N. bicarinatus deposited in the MPEG herpetological collection from eastern Pará, Amazonas, Amapá, Maranhão, and also some specimens from French Guiana, Guyana and Suriname. Initially, 50 males, 50 females, and 50 young individuals will be measured. For each specimen, 20 morphological characters will be measured (lengths: rostro-anal, head, tail, forelimb, hind limb; head width and height; number of paravertebral tubercles, of transverse rows of ventral scales, of ventral scales in a transverse row, of scales around the body, of supralabial and infralabial scales, number of subdigital lamellae of the 4th finger and the 4th arrow; presence or absence of azygous shield between frontonasal and prefrontal scales; contact (median) or not of the second pair of mental scales; number of temporal scales, of pores (femoral + preanal) and n° of scales on the semitransparent disk of the lower palp). Twenty-five females have already been measured, the results will be presented and discussed in a seminar.