''Ichthyophis supachaii'', or Supachai's caecilian, is a species of
caecilian
Caecilians (; ) are a group of limbless, vermiform or serpentine amphibians. They mostly live hidden in the ground and in stream substrates, making them the least familiar order of amphibians. Caecilians are mostly distributed in the tropics of ...
in the family
Ichthyophiidae
The Ichthyophiidae are the family of Asiatic tailed caecilians or fish caecilians found in South and Southeast Asia as well as southernmost China.
They are primitive caecilians, lacking many of the derived characters found in the other families ...
found in
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...
's provinces of
Nakhon Si Thammarat
Nakhon Si Thammarat Municipality ( th, เทศบาลนครนครศรีธรรมราช, ; from Pali ''Nagara Sri Dhammaraja'') is a municipality (''thesaban nakhon'') in Southern Thailand, capital of Nakhon Si Thammarat prov ...
and
Trang, and possibly
Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
.
It is known mostly from 11 specimens of various ages collected in 1958 by
Edward Harrison Taylor
Edward Harrison Taylor (April 23, 1889 – June 16, 1978) was an American herpetologist from Missouri.
Family
Taylor was born in Maysville, Missouri, to George and Loretta Taylor. He had an older brother, Eugene.
Education
Taylor studied at th ...
at several localities in a wide area of tropical forest in southern Thailand. Later, it was recorded among the moist banks of a river near an abandoned zinc mine. It is likely to be threatened by
habitat loss
Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...
.
References
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supachaii
Amphibians described in 1960
Amphibians of Thailand
Taxonomy articles created by Polbot
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