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Sky Islands are high-elevation environments that are separated by warmer, low elevations, forming natural patches of unique montane habitat that often persist through changing climates. Peninsular India was ancestrally forested and has gradually become more arid since at least the Oligocene, and open landscapes have dominated since the middle-late Miocene. Mesic forests today are largely restricted to coastal mountains and some other montane habitats. A mitochondrial phylogeny and fossil-calibrated timetree of Indian Hemiphyllodactylus reveal an Indochinese origin and an endemic radiation with 12 species-level lineages, where a single species was known, that diversified in the Oligocene-Miocene across montane forest habitats in the Eastern Ghats and south India. The phylogeny also suggests the discontinuous Eastern Ghats mountain range encompasses two distinct biogeographic entities: north and south of the Pennar/Krishna-Godavari River basins. This study highlights the deep history of the region and the importance of montane habitats as islands of unique biodiversity that have persisted through millions of years of changing climates. We describe three new species: Hemiphyllodactylus arakuensis sp. nov., H. jnana sp. nov. and H. kolliensis sp. nov. from montane habitats above 1000 m. The montane habitats of these species are emerging hotspots of reptile endemism, and this study emphasizes the need for systematic biodiversity inventory across India to uncover basic patterns of diversity and distribution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Factors shaping biotic assembly of an island compared with the mainland are of considerable interest in biogeography, and the island of Sri Lanka and mainland India provide an interesting setting in which to study this process. We tested two contrasting hypotheses, faunal exchange vs. in situ diversification, to explain how the biota of Sri Lanka might have assembled. We studied the radiation of Hemidactylus geckos, endemic to India and Sri Lanka, to understand the biogeographical processes underlying the faunal assembly of Sri Lanka. We performed molecular phylogenetic analysis, divergence data estimation and ancestral area reconstruction. Diversification in this radiation began ~34.5 Mya in India, followed by seven independent dispersal events from India to Sri Lanka. Two dispersal events occurred in the Early to Middle Miocene, leading to two endemic Sri Lankan species. Marine transgression events separating the two landmasses are likely to have led to vicariant speciation in these cases. The other five dispersal events led to range expansion in species largely restricted to open semi-arid habitats and were likely to be more recent. These results indicate that the biotic exchange model better explains the assembly of Sri Lankan Hemidactylus geckos. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We describe two new species of the lacertid genus Ophisops based on a series of 19 specimens from semi-arid habitats in the states of Gujarat and Rajasthan in northwestern India, provide a description of Ophisops microlepis sensu stricto, and a key to Indian Ophisops. Ophisops pushkarensis sp. nov. and Ophisops kutchensis sp. nov. are allied to Ophisops microlepis and can be diagnosed from all other Indian Ophisops by the fusion of the lower and upper eyelids, their large body size (snout to vent length > 50 mm), and ≥ 50 scales around midbody. They differ from O. microlepis and each other in the number of scales around midbody, the number of dorsal scales, subtle colour pattern differences, as well as uncorrected mitochondrial sequence divergence (6-9%). These are some of the only known endemic reptiles in these semi-arid landscapes and indicate that many other such habitats may harbour endemic biodiversity. www.zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:3CD04F6F-D699-4100-A462-9BDD4B36FEE2 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examined two specimens of short-tailed, unstriped Ichthyophis Fitzinger, 1843 collected in 1949 from the Anamalai Hills of the Western Ghats of peninsular India. One of these specimens was identified previously as the peninsular Indian I. subterrestris Taylor, 1960, the other as I. sikkimensis Taylor, 1960, a species known otherwise only from Nepal and the Indian states of Sikkim and West Bengal, approximately 2,200 km to the northeast. We find that the two specimens in question are conspecific, that both have been misidentified and that the pair together probably belong to an undescribed species. Our conclusion that I. sikkimensis does not occur in peninsular India removes a major biogeographic anomaly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Xanthophryneis a toad genus endemic to the northern Western Ghats of India, with two extant sister species – Xanthophryne koynayensisandXanthophryne tigerina. Both species are local endemics and endangered. We studied reproductive biology of these toads and found that they are specialized to the lateritic rocky outcrops at mid-elevations in high rainfall areas.Xanthophrynetoads have sporadic, multiple spawning bouts lasting 2–4 days during early monsoon. In this explosive breeding behaviour, we observed male toads to engage in ‘pelvic thrusts’, a unique and novel behaviour among anurans. Females oviposit in shallow pools in depressions of lateritic boulders where their tadpoles metamorphose. These ephemeral rocky pools have limited resources and they desiccate rapidly with a break in the rains. To mitigate the stochastic risk of desiccation and subsequent large-scale egg/tadpole mortality, females may disperse their reproductive investment spatially and temporally in multiple clutches, and tadpoles metamorphose rapidly. Here, we describe the amplexus, spawning and male advertisement call, and provide a comparative account of the life history traits of the twoXanthophrynespecies. These toads face numerous threats and are in need of urgent conservation action. These toads, seemingly well adapted to the isolated rocky outcrops, offer an excellent opportunity to understand endemism, mating systems, anuran ecology and behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Molecular data are increasingly being used to resolve cryptic species complexes; however, subsequent formal species description and taxonomic revisions often remain incomplete. Given that most species are described based on morphology-based alpha taxonomy, one cannot resolve nomenclatural issues of species complexes without the aid of morphology. In this study, we examined the taxonomic status of a long-known human commensal and species complex, Hemidactylus brookii. To this end, samples of H. cf . brookii and related species were collected across India. We analyzed molecular as well as morphological data to resolve the taxonomy of this species complex. Seven deeply divergent, well-supported clades were recovered using the mitochondrial phylogeny, five of which were also retrieved in the nuclear tree. One of these consists of five morphologically distinct species of ground-dwelling Hemidactylus. The genetic distances across each clade of putative species of H. brookii sensu lato were comparable to that between morphologically distinct species of ground-dwelling Hemidactylus. Meristic characters such as number of precloacal-femoral pores, number of non-pore bearing scales interrupting the series of pored scales, dorsal pholidosis, and presence/absence of divided lamellae can be used to distinguish these putative species from each other. However, morphological characters of H. brookii sensu stricto did not correspond to any of the putative species studied. The study also revealed that the ' H. brookii complex' in India includes two commensal species, Hemidactylus parvimaculatus and Hemidactylus murrayi. Furthermore, these two lineages have independently acquired adaptations that could have assisted them in exploiting human habitat. An identification key to diagnose species within this complex and rest of the Hemidactylus in India is proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim Indian biodiversity is concentrated in the wet zone, which is disjunctly distributed in the north-east and in the peninsular Western and Eastern Ghats. The Eastern Ghats region is smaller and less well explored biologically and the affinities and origins of its biota poorly understood. Our aim was to assess whether divergence between east and west lineages might have been caused by fragmentation of the wet zone during Pleistocene climatic fluctuations, by Late Miocene wet-zone contraction or by more ancient events. We present the first dated phylogenetic test of these alternatives by inferring relationships and dating divergences within a wet-zone-restricted lineage endemic to the Eastern and Western Ghats. Location The Eastern and Western Ghats regions of peninsular India. Methods Molecular genetic data (one nuclear and four mitochondrial genes) were newly generated for the only known Eastern Ghats teresomatan caecilian amphibian ( Gegeneophis orientalis) and the only Western Ghats congener ( G. pareshi) for which molecular data were not previously available. Phylogenetic relationships were inferred for Indian indotyphlids using maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference methods. Divergence times within the inferred phylogeny were estimated using a Bayesian relaxed clock method, with the Seychelles versus Indian indotyphlid divergence calibrated based on the geological separation of their respective continental land masses. Results The single Eastern Ghats species of Gegeneophis is sister to all other (Western Ghats) Gegeneophis. The basalmost (and east-west) split within Gegeneophis likely occurred > 35 Ma. Main conclusions Divergence between Eastern and Western Ghats Gegeneophis is too ancient to have been caused by wet-zone contraction in the Miocene or by Pleistocene climatic fluctuations. Our results are consistent with a relatively ancient origin of wet-zone lineages in the Eastern Ghats and a lack of gene flow between Eastern and Western Ghats Gegeneophis for tens of millions of years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides information on a study which analyzed putative Hemidactylus (H.) brookii gekkonid lizard taxonomy through a molecular systematic approach. The two recovered clades consisted of specimens from Borneo, Myanmar, Peninsular Malaysia and Karnataka, southwestern India, as well as Sri Lanka, Mauritius and Kerala, southwestern India. It explains that maximum parsimony and Bayesian optimality criteria were utilized to examine phylogenetic relationships among the samples. In addition, genomic DNA was isolated from 95-100 percent ethanol-preserved tail or liver samples.

A new species of Hemidactylus gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae) is described from Girnar in the Junagadh district of Gujarat, India. This medium-sized, chiefly rupicolous gecko may be distinguished from its south Asian congeners by having 12-16 rows of irregularly arranged, flattened to weakly conical dorsal tubercles, 7-9 subdigital lamellae on digit I of the pes and 10-11 on digit IV, and 12-14 femoral pores on each thigh separated by a median diastema. This is the second Hemidactylus currently regarded as endemic to Gujarat and the 10th member of the genus recorded for the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]