:''Common names: Mauritius snakes,
Round Island boas, splitjaw snakes.''
The Bolyeriidae are a
family of
snakes
Snakes are elongated, limbless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes . Like all other squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more joi ...
native to
Mauritius and a few islands around it, especially
Round Island. They also used to be found on the island of Mauritius, but were
extirpated there due to human influence and foraging pigs in particular.
These snakes used to be placed in the
Boidae, but are now classed as a separate family. Two
monotypic genera
Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nomenclat ...
are recognized, but only a single
species is
extant
Extant is the opposite of the word extinct. It may refer to:
* Extant hereditary titles
* Extant literature, surviving literature, such as ''Beowulf'', the oldest extant manuscript written in English
* Extant taxon, a taxon which is not extinct, ...
.
Bolyeriidae appear to be most closely related to the Asian genus ''
Xenophidion
''Xenophidion'' is a genus of snakes first described in 1995, and the only genus of the monotypic family Xenophidiidae.. Commonly referred to as spinejaw snakes, this genus is found in Borneo and peninsular Malaysia.
Morphology and classificatio ...
''.
Geographic range
Found in Mauritius.
Genera
T)
Type genus.
Both of these monotypic genera once inhabited Mauritius and/or a number of islands around it. However, ''Bolyeria'' hasn't been reported since 1975 and is believed to be extinct, while ''Casarea'' is known to survive only on
Round Island.
References
Further reading
*
*
Hoffstetter R (1946). "''Remarques sur la classification des Ophidiens et particulièrement des Boides des Mascareignes (Boylerinae subfam. nov.)''". ''Bulletin du Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle'', Series 2, 18 (1): 132-135. (in French).
External links
Bolyeriids at Life is Short, but Snakes are Long
{{Taxonbar, from=Q582998
Reptiles of Mauritius
Endemic fauna of Mauritius
Taxa named by Robert Hoffstetter
Snake families