Draco maculatus

Draco maculatus
Spotted Flying Dragon
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Order: Squamata
Suborder: Iguania
Family: Agamidae
Genus: Draco
Species: D. maculatus
Binomial name
Draco maculatus
Cantor, 1847
Synonyms

Dracunculus maculatus Gray 1845
Draco divergens TAYLOR 1934
Draco haasei Boettger 1893

Draco maculatus is an agamid flying lizard capable of gliding from tree to tree found in parts of Southeast Asia. It is commonly named the Spotted Flying Dragon.

Contents

Description

Head small; snout a little longer than the diameter of the orbit; nostril lateral, directed outwards ; tympanum scaly. Upper head-scales unequal, strongly keeled; a compressed prominent scale on the posterior part of the superciliary region; 7 to 11 upper labials. The male's gular appendage very large, always much longer than the bead, and frequently twice as long ; female also with a well-developed but smaller gular sac. Male with a very small nuchal crest. Dorsal scales but little larger than the ventrals, irregular, smooth or very feebly keeled; on each side of the back a series of large trihedral keeled distant scales. The fore limb stretched forwards reaches beyond the tip of the snout; the adpressed hind limb reaches a little beyond the elbow of the adpressed fore limb, or to the axilla. Greyish above, with more or less distinct darker markings; a more or less distinct darker mterorbital spot; wing-membranes above with numerous small round black spots, which are seldom confluent, beneath immaculate or with a few black epots; a blue spot on each side of the base of the gular appendage.[1]

From snout to vent 3.25 inches ; tail 4.5.

Three races are noted

  • divergens: Nw Thailand; Terra typica: Chiang Mai, N Siam; restricted to Doi Suthep Mountain by TAYLOR 1963.
  • haasei: E Thailand, Cambodia, S Vietnam; Terra typica: Chantaboon, Siam.
  • whiteheadi: N Vietnam, Hainan; Terra typica: Five-finger Mountains, interior of Hainan.

Distribution

From Assam and Yunnan to Singapore.

Southern China (Hainan, Guangxi, Yunnan, Tibet), India (E. Himalayas to Assam), Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Thailand and W. Malaysia.

Notes

  1. ^ Boulenger, G. A. 1890. Fauna of British India. Reptilia and Batrachia.

References

  • Boettger,O. 1893 Ein neuer Drache (Draco) aus Siam. Zool. Anz. 16: 429-430
  • Boulenger, G.A. 1885 Catalogue of the Lizards in the British Museum (Nat. Hist.) I. Geckonidae, Eublepharidae, Uroplatidae, Pygopodidae, Agamidae. London: 450 pp.
  • Boulenger,G.A. 1900 On the reptiles, batrachians (and fishes) collected by the late Mr. John Whitehead in the interior of Hainan. Proc. Zool. Soc. London 1899: 956-959
  • Cantor. T. E. 1847 Catalogue of reptiles inhabiting the Malayan Peninsula and Islands. J Asiat. Soc., Bengal, Calcutta. 16 (2): 607 - 656, 897-952, 1026–1078
  • Gray, J. E. 1845 Catalogue of the specimens of lizards in the collection of the British Museum. Trustees of die British Museum/Edward Newman, London: xxvii + 289 pp.
  • Günther, A. 1861 Second list of Siamese reptiles. Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. (3) 8: 266-268
  • McGuire, Jimmy A. & Heang, Kiew Bong 2001 Phylogenetic systematics of Southeast Asian flying lizards (Iguania: Agamidae: Draco) as inferred from mitochondrial DNA sequence data. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 72: 203-229

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