Simalia

Genus of snakes

Simalia

Adult High-Yellow Sorong Amethystine Scrub Python
Scientific classification
Kingdom:  | Animalia
Phylum:  | Chordata
Class:  | Reptilia
Order:  | Squamata
Suborder:  | Serpentes
Family:  | Pythonidae
Genus:  | Simalia
Gray, 1849
Type species
Simalia amethistina

Simalia is a genus of snakes in the family Pythonidae.[1]

## Taxonomy

[edit]

Simalia Gray, 1849, was considered a taxonomic synonym of

* Liasis (a genus of non-venomous pythons found in Indonesia, New Guinea and Australia) and
* Morelia (a genus of large snakes, in the family Pythonidae, found in Australia, Indonesia and New Guinea),

but Reynolds et al. (2014)[2] resurrected the genus for the Morelia amethistina species group (which, together with Morelia viridis, had made the genus Morelia paraphyletic).

## Species

[edit]

The genus Simalia contains the following species:[1]

Image  | Species  | Distribution

|
|

| S. amethistina (Schneider, 1801) (type species)  | Indonesia, Papua New Guinea
| S. boeleni (Brongersma, 1953) | New Guinea
| S. clastolepis (Harvey et al., 2000) | Indonesia
| S. kinghorni (Stull, 1933) | northern Australia
| S. nauta (Harvey et al., 2000) | Indonesia
| S. tracyae (Harvey et al., 2000) | Indonesian island of Halmahera

As of June 2022, ITIS and the IUCN Red List also identify the Oenpelli python as Simalia oenpelliensis, while The Reptile Database places it in the monotypic genus Nyctophilopython.[3][4][5]

Nota bene: A binomial authority in parentheses indicates that the species was originally described in a genus other than Simalia.

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b Simalia at the Reptarium.cz Reptile Database. Accessed 22 June 2022.
2. ^ Reynolds, R. Graham; Niemiller, Matthew L.; Revell, Liam J. (2014). "Toward a Tree-of-Life for the boas and pythons: Multilocus species-level phylogeny with unprecedented taxon sampling" (PDF). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. 71: 201–213\. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2013.11.011. PMID 24315866.
3. ^ "Simalia oenpelliensis (Gow, 1977)". Integrated Taxonomic Information System. Retrieved 20 June 2022.
4. ^ Woinarski, J.; Gillespie, G.; Greenlees, M.; McDonald, P.; Fenner, A. (2017). "Simalia oenpelliensis ". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2017: e.T42494211A42494251. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2017-3.RLTS.T42494211A42494251.en. Retrieved 22 June 2022.
5. ^ Nyctophilopython oenpelliensis at the Reptarium.cz Reptile Database. Accessed 20 June 2022.

## Further reading

[edit]

* Gray JE (1849). Catalogue of the Specimens of Snakes in the Collection of the British Museum. London: Trustees of the British Museum. (Edward Newman, printer). xv + 125 pp. (Simalia, new genus, p. 91).

Taxon identifiers

Simalia|

* Wikidata: Q7517342
* Wikispecies: Simalia
* AFD: Simalia
* CoL: 7GYC
* GBIF: 4820518
* iNaturalist: 539186
* IRMNG: 1356683
* ITIS: 1094033
* NCBI: 1497996
* Open Tree of Life: 5557426