Ophisops Ménétriés, 1832

Šmíd, Jiří, Moravec, Jiří, Kodym, Petr, Kratochvíl, Lukáš, Yousefkhani, Seyyed Saeed Hosseinian, Rastegar-Pouyani, Eskandar & Frynta, Daniel, 2014, Annotated checklist and distribution of the lizards of Iran, Zootaxa 3855 (1), pp. 1-97 : 39-40

Ophisops Ménétriés, 1832

Ophisops elegans Ménétriés, 1832

SYNTYPES. MNHN 544 , USNM 21396; Syntypes BMNH 1946.8.4.43–45 (ex. BMNH 99.9.30.22–24), BMNH 1946.8.4.70–73 (ex. BMNH 99.9.30.5–8), BMNH 1946.8.4.74–76 (ex. BMNH 99.9.30.19–21), BMNH 1946.9.4.2–3 (ex. BMNH 74.11.23.99), BMNH 1946.9 .4.4 (ex. BMNH 99.9.30.11) (O. e. persicus ); Holotype FMNH 19721 (O. e. blanfordi ) .

TYPE LOCALITY. “à quelques verstes de Bakou ” [= near Baku, Azerbaijan] .

DISTRIBUTION. SE Balkans, Turkey, Levant, Transcaucasia, Iraq, Iran. An isolated population occurs in N Algeria. DISTRIBUTION IN IRAN. Fig. 114 . Throughout the western and southwestern part of the country along and around the Zagros range, southern Alborz, Mesopotamian Plain, and on the southern Iranian plateau up to the border with Pakistan.

HABITAT. Wide range of habitats mostly with hard-soil or stony substrate and with low steppe vegetation, flat hammadas, river banks or low foothills. Ophisops elegans does not avoid the presence of humans and can be often found near human settlements in gardens, field margins, and also in cities wherever proper microhabitat with at least some vegetation to hide in appears. We observed this species on many localities syntopic with its ecological counterpart, M. watsonana , contrary to the findings of Anderson (1999; p. 255).

REMARKS. Currently there are eight valid subspecies of O. elegans ( Uetz 2013) , three of which are supposed to occur in Iran: the nominotypical form in the north, O. e. persicus Boulenger described from localities scattered through the whole Iranian range (West Azerbaijan, Esfahan, Shiraz, and Kerman Prov.), and O. e. blanfordi Schmidt in the Mesopotamian Plain ( Moravec 1998; Sindaco & Jeremčenko 2008). Despite the large number of described forms and varieties there have been no detailed comparative morphological analysis we are aware of conducted in order to assess the validity of existing and synonymized taxa. According to Kyriazi et al. (2008), the populations from the eastern part of its range ( Iran, Turkey, Armenia) diverged from a clade consisting of the Mediterranean populations together with O. occidentalis Boulenger about 8.11 Mya. Given that O. elegans is paraphyletic with respect to O. occidentalis and the large number of potentially available names, the taxonomy of Ophisops requires further investigation.

REFERENCES. Boulenger (1918); Schmidt (1939); Anderson (1999); Torki (2007c); Kyriazi et al. (2008); RastegarPouyani et al. (2009c); Oraie et al. (2012, 2013, 2014); Gharzi & Yari (2013).

Figures

FIGURES 110–115. 110. Lacerta media. 111. Lacerta strigata. 112. Mesalina brevirostris. Blue square denotes the type locality for M. b. fieldi. 113. Mesalina watsonana. 114. Ophisops elegans. 115. Timon kurdistanicus.