A study on Ptyas doriae (Boulenger, 1888) with comments on the status of Ptyas hamptoni (Boulenger, 1900) (Squamata: Colubridae: Colubrinae).

Ptyas doriae is a rare snake in northeastern India, Myanmar and southern China. The original description and subsequent accounts of this species were all very brief. We studied most of the available specimens of this species and on this basis we provide a detailed redescription of the species. We give an account of intrapopulational variation in scalation characters and colouration and we also report on a previously undescribed colour morph from Manipur, India. We have examined the holotype of Ptyas hamptoni and found that characters used to distinguish it from P. doriae are inadequate and therefore we herein synonymize the former with the latter species. We also predict the potential distribution of P. doriae by using Maximum Entropy modeling.