Wolf Snakes

Lycodon subcinctus, Malayan banded wolfsnake, in Letefoho, East Timor

Lycodon is a genus of colubrid snakes, commonly known as wolf snakes.^[3] The Neo-Latin name Lycodon is derived from the Greek words λύκος (lykos) meaning wolf and οδόν (odon) meaning tooth,^[4] and refers to the fang-like anterior maxillary and mandibular teeth.^[2] They are nonvenomous, but many members of this genus strongly resemble the venomous kraits in appearance, an example of Batesian mimicry.

Species

The genus Lycodon comprises 73 recognized species.^[5]

• Lycodon albofuscus (A.M.C. Duméril, Bibron & A.H.A. Duméril, 1854) - dark wolf snake
• Lycodon alcalai Ota & Ross, 1994 - Alcala's wolf snake
• Lycodon anakradaya Nguyen, Duong, Wood, Grismer, 2022
• Lycodon anamallensis Günther, 1864 - Colombo wolf snake
• Lycodon aulicus (Linnaeus, 1758) - Indian wolf snake, common wolf snake
• Lycodon banksi Luu et al., 2018 - Banks's wolf snake
• Lycodon bibonius Ota & Ross, 1994 - Ota's wolf snake
• Lycodon bicolor (Nikolsky, 1903) - Mackinnon's wolf snake
• Lycodon butleri Boulenger, 1900 - Butler's wolf snake
• Lycodon capucinus F. Boie, 1827 - common wolf snake
• Lycodon cardamomensis Daltry & Wüster, 2002
• Lycodon carinatus (Kuhl, 1820) - Ceylon wolf snake
• Lycodon cathaya J. Wang, Qi, Lyu, Zeng & Y.-Y. Wang, 2020 - Huaping wolf snake
• Lycodon cavernicolus Grismer et al., 2011 - Gua Wang Burma wolf snake
• Lycodon chapaensis (Angel & Bourret, 1933) - Namdong wolf snake
• Lycodon chithrasekarai Wickramasinghe et al., 2020 - Chithrasekara’s bridle snake
• Lycodon chrysoprateros Ota & Ross, 1994 - Ross's wolf snake
• Lycodon davidi G. Vogel et al., 2012 - David’s wolf snake
• Lycodon davisonii (Blanford, 1878) - Blanford's bridal snake
• Lycodon deccanensis Ganesh, Deuti, Punith, Achyuthan, Mallik, Adhikari & G. Vogel, 2020
• Lycodon dumerili (Boulenger, 1893) - Duméril's wolf snake
• Lycodon effraenis Cantor, 1847 - brown wolf snake
• Lycodon fasciatus (J. Anderson, 1879)
• Lycodon fasciolatus (Shaw, 1802) - banded wolf snake
• Lycodon fausti Gaulke, 2002 - Faust’s wolf snake
• Lycodon ferroni Lanza, 1999 - Ferron’s Asian wolf snake
• Lycodon flavicollis Mukherjee & Bhupathy, 2007 - yellow-collared wolf snake
• Lycodon flavomaculatus Wall, 1907 - yellow-spotted wolf snake
• Lycodon flavozonatus (Pope, 1928) - yellow-banded big tooth snake, yellow-spotted wolf snake, big-tooth snake
• Lycodon futsingensis (Pope, 1928)
• Lycodon gammiei (Blanford, 1878) - Gammie's wolf snake, Sikkim false wolf snake
• Lycodon gibsonae G. Vogel & David, 2019 - Gibson’s wolf snake
• Lycodon gongshan G. Vogel & Luo, 2011 - Gongshan wolf snake
• Lycodon gracilis (Günther, 1864) - scarce bridal snake
• Lycodon hypsirhinoides (Theobald, 1868)
• Lycodon jara (Shaw, 1802) - twin-spotted wolf snake
• Lycodon kundui M.A. Smith, 1943
• Lycodon laoensis Günther, 1864 - Laotian wolf snake
• Lycodon liuchengchaoi Zhang et al., 2011
• Lycodon meridionalis (Bourret, 1935)
• Lycodon muelleri A.M.C. Duméril, Bibron & A.H.A. Duméril, 1854 - Müller’s wolf snake
• Lycodon multifasciatus (Maki, 1931)
• Lycodon multizonatus (Zhao & Y.-M. Jiang, 1981) - Luding wolf snake, Luding Kukri snake
• Lycodon nympha (Daudin, 1803) - Vellore bridal snake
• Lycodon obvelatus K. Wang, Yu, G. Vogel & Che, 2020 - recluse wolf snake
• Lycodon ophiophagus G. Vogel et al., 2009 - snake-eater wolf snake
• Lycodon orientalis (Hilgendorf, 1880) - Oriental odd-tooth snake
• Lycodon paucifasciatus Rendahl in M.A. Smith, 1943 - Rendahl's wolf snake
• Lycodon philippinus Griffin, 1909 - Philippine dryocalamus
• Lycodon pictus Janssen, Pham, Ngo, Le, Nguyen & Ziegler, 2019
• Lycodon rosozonatus (Hu & Zhao, 1972) - rose big-tooth snake
• Lycodon rufozonatus Cantor, 1842 - red-banded snake
• Lycodon ruhstrati (Fischer, 1886) - mountain wolf snake, Formosa wolf snake
• Lycodon sealei Leviton, 1955 - Seale’s banded Asian wolf snake
• Lycodon semicarinatus (Cope, 1860) - Loo-Choo big-tooth snake, Ryukyu odd-tooth snake
• Lycodon septentrionalis (Günther, 1875) - white-banded wolf snake, northern large-toothed snake
• Lycodon serratus K. Wang, Yu, G. Vogel & Che, 2020 - serrate-banded wolf snake
• Lycodon sidiki Wostl, Hamidy, Kurniawan & E.N. Smith, 2017
• Lycodon solivagus Ota & Ross, 1994 - common wolf snake
• Lycodon stormi Boettger, 1892 - Sulawesi wolf snake
• Lycodon striatus (Shaw, 1802) - northern wolf snake, barred wolf snake
• Lycodon subannulatus (A.M.C. Duméril, Bibron & A.H.A. Duméril, 1854) - Malayan bridal snake, southern bridle snake
• Lycodon subcinctus F. Boie, 1827 - Malayan banded wolf snake
• Lycodon synaptor G. Vogel & David, 2010 - Boehme’s wolf snake
• Lycodon tessellatus Jan, 1863 - Manila wolf snake
• Lycodon tiwarii Biswas & Sanyal, 1965 - Andaman wolf snake
• Lycodon travancoricus (Beddome, 1870) - Travancore wolf snake
• Lycodon tristrigatus Günther, 1858
• Lycodon truongi Nguyen, Duong, Wood, Grismer, 2022 - Truong’s wolf snake
• Lycodon zawi Slowinski et al., 2001^[6] - Zaw's wolf snake
• Lycodon zayuensis K. Jiang, Wang, Jin & Che, 2020
• Lycodon zoosvictoriae Neang et al., 2014 - Zoos Victoria’s wolf snake

Nota bene: A binomial authority in parentheses indicates that the species was originally described in a genus other than Lycodon.

References