Mexico, Zacatecas, Municipality of Valparaiso, ca. 2 km (airline) west of San Juan Capistrano, (22.637258° N; 104.118608° W [WGS84]; 1249 m elevation), 18 July 2017. Collected by Jorge A.
Bañuelos-Alamillo. The snake was deposited in the Vertebrate Collection at Universidad Autónoma de Aguascalientes (CZUAA-REP-690); a photo voucher is also available at the San Diego Natural History Museum (SDSNH_HerpPC_05366). Adult female (SVL= 900 mm, TL= 380 mm), and had 17 midbody dorsal scales, 188 ventral scales, 106 subcaudals, nine supralabials, 11 infralabials, two loreal scales, one preocular, and three postoculars on both sides (Fig.
1-A). The snake was road-killed near a river within dry forest vegetation and had recently consumed an adult male Aspidoscelis gularis scalaris ingested headfirst.Asociación Herpetológica Argentin

Ahumada Carrillo, Iván T.

Bañuelos Alamillo, Jorge A.

Carbajal Márquez, Rubén A.

Quintero Díaz, Gustavo E.

Cuadernos de Herpetología

English

El Servicio de Difusión de la Creación Intelectual

Novedad zoogeográfica
45
Author for correspondence: redman031@hotmail.com
The Mexican Patch-nosed Snake, Salvadora mexicana 
(Duméril, Bibron & Duméril, 1854; Squamata: Colubridae): 
a new state record for Zacatecas, Mexico, and a new prey 
species
Jorge A. Bañuelos-Alamillo1, Iván T. Ahumada-Carrillo2, Gustavo E. Quintero-Díaz 3,5, Rubén 
A. Carbajal-Márquez4, 5
1 Unidad Académica de Ciencias Biológicas, Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas, Edificio de Biología Campus 
II Ave. Preparatoria S/N, Col. Agronómica, 98066, Zacatecas, Zacatecas, México.
2 Centro Universitario de Ciencias Biológicas y Agropecuarias, Carretera a Nogales Km. 15.5. Las Agujas, 
Nextipac, Zapopan, Jalisco, México.
3 Universidad Autónoma de Aguascalientes, Centro de Ciencias Básicas, Departamento de Biología. 20131, 
Aguascalientes, Aguascalientes, México.
4 El Colegio de la Frontera Sur. Departamento de Sistemática y Ecología Acuática. Unidad Chetumal, Av. 
Centenario Km 5.5, 77014, Chetumal, Quintana Roo, México.
5 Conservación de la Biodiversidad del Centro de México, A. C. Andador Torre de Marfil No. 100, 20229, 
Aguascalientes, Aguascalientes, México.
Cuad. herpetol. 33 (1): 45-47 (2019)
Localities- Mexico, Zacatecas, Municipality of 
Valparaiso, ca. 2 km (airline) west of San Juan Cap-
istrano, (22.637258° N; 104.118608° W [WGS84]; 
1249 m elevation), 18 July 2017. Collected by Jorge A. 
Bañuelos-Alamillo. The snake was deposited in the 
Vertebrate Collection at Universidad Autónoma de 
Aguascalientes (CZUAA-REP-690); a photo voucher 
is also available at the San Diego Natural History 
Museum (SDSNH_HerpPC_05366). Adult female 
(SVL= 900 mm, TL= 380 mm), and had 17 midbody 
dorsal scales, 188 ventral scales, 106 subcaudals, nine 
supralabials, 11 infralabials, two loreal scales, one 
preocular, and three postoculars on both sides (Fig. 
1-A). The snake was road-killed near a river within 
dry forest vegetation and had recently consumed 
an adult male Aspidoscelis gularis scalaris ingested 
headfirst (Fig. 1-C). 
Mexico, Jalisco, Municipality of Mezquitic, 4.5 
km southwest of San Miguel Huaixtita (22.050361° 
N, 104.334153° W [WGS84]; 1460 m elevation), 24 
September 2015. Found by Iván, T. Ahumada-Carri-
llo and Miguel Ángel L. Cuéllar. The specimen was 
photographed and then released; a photo voucher is 
available (SDSNH_HerpPC_05365; Fig. 1-B). Adult 
female found foraging on the ground in dry forest.
Comments- The genus Salvadora Baird & Girard, 
1853 consists of eight species referred to as patch-
nosed snakes because of a conspicuously enlarged 
rostral shield. These are fast-moving, terrestrial, 
and diurnal snakes that collectively range from dry 
areas of the southwestern United States of America 
to tropical forests in northern Central America 
(Köhler, 2008; Heimes, 2016; Uetz et al., 2019). They 
feed primarily on lizards, but their diet also includes 
snakes, reptile eggs, amphibians, and small mam-
mals (Shaw and Campbell, 1974; Carbajal-Márquez 
et al., 2014; Santos-Bibiano et al., 2016; Jiménez-
Arcos et al., 2018). 
Salvadora mexicana (Duméril, Bibron & 
Duméril, 1854) is endemic to Mexico, occurring 
from Nayarit along the Pacific coast to the border 
of Guerrero and Oaxaca. The distribution also 
includes the Santiago River Basin in Jalisco, Balsas 
Basin in Michoacán, México, and Morelos, and the 
Tehuacán Valley in Puebla (Davis and Smith, 1953; 
Camarillo-Rangel, 1983; Ponce-Campos and García-
Aguayo, 2007). The species is listed in Mexico as 
(Pr) “Sujetas a Protección Especial” by the Norma 
Oficial Mexicana (NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010, 
Diario Oficial de la Federación, 2010) and listed by 
IUCN as Least Concern (LC) (Ponce-Campos and 
García-Aguayo, 2007). Its Environmental Vulnerabi-
lity Score (EVS) has been gauged as 15, placing it in 
the lower portion of the high vulnerability category 
(Wilson et al., 2013). It reaches a maximum snout–
46
J. A. Bañuelos-Alamillo et al. - Salvadora mexicana a new record for Zacatecas
vent length (SVL) of 915 mm and a maximum total 
length of 1500 mm, with males larger than females 
(Smith, 1938; García and Ceballos, 1994; Ramírez-
Bautista, 1994). 
This species feeds on a variety of small ver-
tebrates, including lizards (Aspidoscelis costatus 
zweifeli, A. deppii infernalis, Ctenosaura pectinata, 
Sceloporus horridus oligoporus, S. pyrocephalus, and 
Urosaurus gadovi), snakes, reptile eggs, rodents, and 
frogs (Agalychnis dacnicolor, Smilisca baudinii, and 
Trachycephalus typhonius, [actually T. vermiculatus]) 
(Davis and Smith, 1953; Duellman, 1961; Ramírez-
Bautista, 1994; Benítez-Gálvez, 1997). Here, we 
document a novel prey species and provide new field 
records that extend the range and add S. mexicana 
to the reptilian fauna of Zacatecas.
These specimens represent new distribution 
records for the upper Santiago River Basin and 
extend the range to the state of Zacatecas. The speci-
men CZUAA-REP-690 extends the known range 
ca. 44 km (airline) north from the closest known 
locality at 9.6 km E El Limón, Mezquitic, Jalisco (KU 
95964; GBIF, 2018) and ca. 68.7 km (airline) north 
from our additional record at 4.5 km southwest of 
San Miguel Huaixtita, Municipality of Mezquitic, 
Jalisco, which closes the gap with the populations 
of the Pacific coast (Fig. 2). Also, the A. g. scalaris 
Figure 1. A) An adult female Salvadora mexicana from San Juan Capistrano, Municipality of Valparaiso, Zacatecas (SDSNH_Her-
pPC_05366). Photo by Jorge A. Bañuelos Alamillo. B) An adult specimen of Salvadora mexicana from San Miguel Huaixtita, Municipality 
of Mezquitic, Jalisco (SDSNH_HerpPC_05365). Photo by Miguel Ángel L. Cuéllar. C) An adult male Aspidocelis gularis scalaris that was 
consumed by Salvadora mexicana from San Juan Capistrano, Municipality of Valparaiso, Zacatecas. Photo by Jorge A. Bañuelos Alamillo.
Figure 2. Collecting localities for Salvadora mexicana at west-
central Mexico. The yellow star represents the new record of S. 
mexicana for Zacatecas; the red spot is our additional record for 
Jalisco; black spots are previous recorded localities. The black 
lines represent state boundaries. The yellow area represents the 
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species distribution of S. mexicana 
(Ponce-Campos and García-Aguayo, 2007).
47
Cuad. herpetol. 33 (1): 45-47 (2019)
represents a new species in the diet of S. mexicana. 
With this new record, there are now three species 
of Salvadora known from Zacatecas: S. bairdi, S. 
grahamiae lineata, and S. mexicana (Morafka, 1977; 
Uetz et al., 2019). Our specimens were found in a 
habitat that in Jalisco, Zacatecas, and surrounding 
areas is rapidly being transformed into crop and 
livestock production, and is also threatened by min-
ing (Sousa and Martínez, 2010). Our discovery of S. 
mexicana suggests that additional species, typical of 
the Coastal Plain, remain to be documented in the 
upper Santiago River Basin.
Acknowledgements
We thank Robert Hansen for review of a draft of the 
manuscript. We thank Miguel Ángel L. Cuéllar for 
field assistance and José Carlos Arenas Monroy for 
verifying the prey species. Specimen collection was 
authorized by SEMARNAT SGPA/DGVS/03079/16.
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doi: 10.31017/CdH.2019.(2019-002)
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The Mexican Patch-nosed Snake, Salvadora mexicana (Duméril, Bibron & Duméril, 1854; Squamata: Colubridae): a new state record for Zacatecas, Mexico, and a new prey species

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The Mexican Patch-nosed Snake, Salvadora mexicana (Duméril, Bibron & Duméril, 1854; Squamata: Colubridae): a new state record for Zacatecas, Mexico, and a new prey species

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