A review of the hispaniolan colubrid snake Genus Ialtris

Of the four endemic Hispaniolan genera of colubrid snakes, the least known is Ialtris Cope. Two species of Ialtris are recognized, each monotypic – dorsalis Günther and parishi Cochran. Neither has been commonly collected. COCHRAN (1941 : 375) listed 12 specimens of I. dorsalis in American collections and presented data from five specimens in the British Museum and the Hamburg Museum. parishi has been known only from the holotype. Our interest in Ialtris stems from a variety of sources. First, collections made by the senior author in Haiti and the República Dominicana since 1962 and latterly under the sponsorship of National Science Foundation grants GB-7977 and B-023603 have included a few specimens of Ialtris. In addition, collections at the Museum of Comparative Zoology (Harvard University) made under NSF grant GB2444 to ERNEST E. WILLIAMS likewise have included some Ialtris. Thus there has been a gradual increase of specimens of the genus from these two sources. Secondly, C. RHEA WARREN has been active in the past few years on the Haitian islands of Gonave and Tortue and at both sites he secured Ialtris. Most remarkably, he took a series of I. parishi on lie de la Tortue, a locality far removed from the type-locality of the species on the southern Tiburon Peninsula in Haiti. Thirdly, the collections made by the senior author include two specimens of a new species of Ialtris. A third specimen of this species was taken in 1974 by the party of FRED G. THOMPSON of the Florida State Museum. Finally, MAGLIO (1970), in his discussion of the affinities of the Antillean “xenodontine” snakes, had relatively little to say about Ialtris and its relationships to other Antillean colubrids. All these facts suggested to us that perhaps this is the time to review what little is known of Ialtris, if for no other reason than our need for comparative data on parishi and dorsalis in respect to the description of the new taxon noted above.