Courtship entanglements: a first report of mating behavior and sexual dichromatism in the Southeast Asian keel-bellied whipsnake, Dryophiops rubescens
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Issue Date
2012-09-01
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
We describe the first observations of courtship behavior and sexual dichromatism in the keel-bellied whipsnake, Dryophiops rubescens, from an encounter near Sandakan, eastern Sabah, Borneo, Malaysia. During this behavior, two males and a female were longitudinally intertwined, with the males jockeying for position along the body of the female. This “mating braid” lasted for well over 1 h, with the entwined snakes moving a distance of over 10 m together. While polygynous mating is known from other snake species, direct observations of mating behaviors in Southeast Asian colubrids are extremely rare. These observations also revealed the presence of sexual dichromatism in D. rubescens, with darker head coloration present in the males.Publisher
Herpetology NotesJournal
Herpetology NotesAdditional Links
http://www.herpetologynotes.seh-herpetology.orgType
Journal articleLanguage
enISSN
2071-5773Collections
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Except where otherwise noted, this item's license is described as Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States