Xylophis mosaicus

Narayanan, Surya, Das, Sandeep, Ghosh, Avrajjal, Palot, Muhamed Jafer, Umesh, P., Gower, David J. & Deepak, V., 2025, Hidden in the Sky Islands: A new species of Xylophis Beddome, 1878 (Serpentes: Pareidae: Xylophiinae) from montane habitats of Wayanad in the Western Ghats of India, Zootaxa 5666 (4), pp. 509-528 : 526-528

Xylophis mosaicus

BNHS 3577 (female, holotype): Eravikulam hut, Eravikulam National Park, Kerala, India BMNH 88.1 .27.42 (male, paratype): Anamalai Hills , 4700 ft

BNHS 3578 (male, paratype): Eravikulam National Park , Kerala, India

BNHS 3579 (female, paratype): Eravikulam National Park , Kerala, India

BNHS 3580 (female, paratype): Eravikulam National Park , Kerala, India

ZSIK 19410 (male): Palani Hills (Kodaikanal)

ZSIK 25123 (female): Kodaikanal Ghat, Tamil Nadu

BMNH 93.4.18.17 (female): High ranges, Travancore

BNHS 1756 (male): Perumal Malai, Palani Hills (Now in Kodaikanal)

BNHS 3128 (male), BNHS 3126 (male), BNHS 3124 (female): Eravikulam National Park BNHS 2871 (female): Munnar

BNHS 1751 (male): Kallar, Travancore (Kerala)

APPENDIX 2. Paratypes of Xylophis chenkaruppan sp. nov. from Kurichyarmala, Wayanad , Kerala in life showing variation in coloration of a larger (200 mm total length: ZSI / WGRC /IR-V.3826) and smaller individual (115 mm total length: ZSI / WGRC /IR-V.3827) .

APPENDIX 3. Plate showing different colour morphs for adults of Xylophis mosaiscus (A–B) and X. perroteti (C–D).

Supplementary Materials. The following supporting information can be downloaded at the DOI landing page of this paper:

Supp. Table 1. List of Primers used in this study with references.

Supp. Table 2. Genbank accession numbers for all Xylophis species and the outgroups used in the study for phylogenetic reconstruction.

Supp. Table 3. Results of PartitionFinder showing the best-fit models used for phylogenetic analysis across all three datasets.

Supp. Table 4. P-distance tables for the sequences of all four genes used in this study.