Nototriton (Nototriton) picadoi (Stejneger, 1911)

Picado’s moss salamander

Spelerpes picadoi Stejneger (1911: 285) .

Oedipus picadoi: Dunn (1924: 99) .

? Pseudoeurycea picadoi: Taylor (1949: 279) .

Chiropterotriton picadoi: Wake & Lynch (1976: 59).

Nototriton picadoi: Wake & Elias (1983: 11).

Nototriton major Good & Wake (1993: 137) .

Nototriton matama Boza-Oviedo et al. (2012: 48) .

Nototriton (Nototriton) picadoi: Dubois and Raffaëlli (2012: 141) .

Holotype. USNM 48280, by original designation, gender not provided in the description: Provincia de Cartago: Cantón de El Guarco: Distrito de San Isidro: La Estrella, ca. 2000 m a.s.l. (Picado 1913), Collected by Clodomido Picado (Stejneger 1911).

Etymology. The specific epithet is a patronym, used as a noun in the masculine genitive case, in dedication to Dr. Clodomiro Picado Twight (1887–1944), who was a very distinguished Costa Rican scientist and the person that collected the holotype of this taxon.

Distribution. Nototriton picadoi is endemic to Costa Rica and is only known to inhabit the Caribbean slopes of extreme eastern portion of the Cordillera Volcánica Central, specifically along the eastern flank of the Turrialba Volcano into the northern and eastern sections of the Cordillera de Talamanca. The reported altitudinal range for this taxon is from 1200–2200 masl (Savage 2002), but during this study the lower limit was discovered to extend down to 900 masl (BK personal observation).

Noteworthy observations or remarks. Due to the very low genetic distances, adjoining distributional ranges, and weakly supported morphological diagnostics, we herein recognized N. major (Good & Wake, 1993) and N. matama (Boza-Oviedo et al., 2012) as junior synonyms under N. picadoi .