fieldherping.eu

Thank you Michael for showing us your nice findings. I always like to see some landscape pictures integrated in a report. That yellowish Dice snake is my favourite. Have to see them myself one time.

Jeroen Speybroeck wrote:in our forthcoming book.

Do you know a date already? Can't wait.

Berislav Horvatic wrote:BTW, I do owe you a special compliment: In your report, you took care to write all the Croatian topography correctly.
Not a single name is misspelled. I think you are the first foreigner who's accomplished that. Not so terribly important,
of course, but still shows certain respect for the country and its people, that's rarely encountered. Thanks for that as
well.

Tank you, Bero! Respect for the country, where we go, should be self-evident, Ithink! So I also try to give correct topography informations.

Berislav Horvatic wrote:BTW, Rana ridibunda has been Pelophylax ridibundus for some years already, so if you want to be a real 100% German, maybe you'd change that.

Thank you for this information, Bero! I'm not really a frog expert!
I can try my very best to get close to an 100% German , so I will change it in this post and later (when I'm home) in my long version Trip report.

Jeroen Speybroeck wrote:A split of Testudo hermanni into 3 species (hermanni, boettgeri, hercegovinensis) has been hinted at certain times. However, the validity of T. (h.) hercegovinensis is questionable, as it seems to overlap genetically and morphologically with T. (h.) boettgeri. That means: even at subspecies level.

I chose Testudo hermanni hercegovinensis after talking to Alex Pieh, because I'm not an expert for Testudo.
This morning I had contact to Alex per Email and he send me the Draco Article:

Pieh, Alexander & Philippen, Hans-Dieter: Die mediterranen Landschildkröten. Draco 32 (2008): 4-34.

It could be intersting for the one's of you, who can read german. You can also get the article in the literature database at Mario's Vipersgarden.

But it is definitely still a discussed topic. And I'm not enogh in it to participate this discussions! I only wanted to refer on Alex' article.
And as I saw, Mario brought good references, too.

and one paper more - in German language:
Schweiger, M. (2009): Bemerkungen zur Systematik, Verbreitung und Variabilität der Dalmatinischen Landschildkröte.- TESTUDO (SIGS), 18(2), Juni 2009: 5 - 21.
http://vipersgarden.at/PDF/TESTUDO09_18.pdf

The 2008 paper says: "Aktuelle genetische Arbeiten, sowohl von FRITZ et. al. (2006) als auch BERORELLE et al. (2007), weisen jedoch auf eine genetische Zugehörigkeit zur „boettgeri“-Gruppe hin, sodass die Form auch als Unterart von T. hermanni interpretiert werden kann."

This says: "hercegovinensis belongs to the "boettgeri" group [what is that? infrasubspecies taxonomy?], so it can be interpreted as a subspecies".

If I translated that correctly, I'd say this violates to concept of what subspecies should be. No, if it's part of a subspecies, it's synonymous to it.

Those yellowish tessellata look amazing, even more colourful than some of those vividly coloured tessellata from Lake Ohrid. Great post!

Dear Jerone,
I don´t like to discuss taxonomy in a Forum. It is stuff for articles with peer reading. However, the “auch” maybe misleading.

What HD wanted to say was:
The view is taken that it could be interpreted as a subspecies of T. hermanni - not as a Species.
Please read the whole part of the article.

Was den taxonomischen Status der
Form angeht, so schwankt die Meinungsbreite
von „nicht valide“ (FRITZ et al.
2006) über „Unterart von Testudo hermanni“
(BLANCK & ESSER 2004) bis hin zu
„eigenständige Art“ (PERÄLÄ 2002,
2004).
Aktuelle genetische Arbeiten, sowohl
von FRITZ et. al. (2006) als auch BERORELLE
et al. (2007), weisen jedoch auf eine
genetische Zugehörigkeit zur „boettgeri“-
Gruppe hin, sodass die Form auch als Unterart
von T. hermanni interpretiert werden
kann.

Sincerely
Alex

... weisen jedoch auf eine genetische Zugehörigkeit zur „boettgeri“-Gruppe hin,
sodass die Form auch als Unterart von T. hermanni interpretiert werden kann.

But WHICH subspecies of T. hermanni? Something "inside" the boettgeri ("group"?),
or a different one?
OK, if it's "close enough" to boettgeri, that does make it a subspecies of T. hermanni,
but if it's TOO close to boettgeri, doesn't that make it just boettgeri and nothing else?

Berislav Horvatic wrote:if it's TOO close to boettgeri, doesn't that make it just boettgeri and nothing else?

My point exactly!

Dear Bero,
I can´t follow you.
What is your exact point Jerone (valid vs. not valid)?
Has a subspecies taxon within a subspecies complex to be related next to the nominotypical form according to your view?
According literature Testudo hermanni herzegovinensis is related nearer to the other subspecies T. h. boettgeri than to the nominotypical T. h. hermanni. An hypothesis could be that the disjunction between this two ssp. is younger than between T. h. hermanni and the ancestor of the both ssp..
I can´t see a contradiction to the subspecies concept.
There is according to my view only one question “Valid or not Valid”.
By the way I would prefer to discuss taxonomy via e-mail. I believe the forum is the wrong place.

@Dear Bero,
many thanks for your information about the snakes! Maybe I´m next time fast enough to find more than a shed skin….

Sincerely yours
Alex