Courtesy from University of Central Florida
Costa Rica has a new venomous snake, the Bothriechis nubestris, located in Talamanca, whose existence was confirmed this week on the world list of snakes.
Publications such as Sci-News and Zootaxa reported that with this new Viper, the number of snakes in Costa Rica amounted to 143.
The discovery was not easy because of the similarities the animal shares with another snake found more than 150 years ago.
It went unnoticed because of its physical appearance and because its colors are very similar to those of the palm tree, dark green viper or tree toboba (Bothriechis nigroviridis), scientifically described in 1859″
cites Sci-News.
Christopher Parkinson, a scientist from the University of Central Florida, was responsible for leading the research. Now, the snake will be known as Talamanca’s dark green viper.
It’s a very interesting phenomenon because it shows the complexity of the catalog of biodiversity in our planet and the need to preserve collections that can be studied,”
said Parkinson.
According to the researcher, this discovery would not have been possible without other similar specimens in natural history museums.
Mahmood Sasa, a Costa Rican scientist who participated in the discovery, told Sci-News that
the discovery of this new species cryptically shows the advantages of using modern molecular techniques and phylogenetic reconstructions in the catalog of planetary biodiversity.”