Bengaluru / Mangaluru: Researchers and Herpetologists have found Snake Kukri species, Oligodon Churahensis, at Himachal Pradesh.
The team that worked on this findings consisted of Zeeshan Mirza from the National Biology Center (Bengaluru), Virendar K Bhardwaj from Nanak Dev University (Amritsar) and Harshil Patel of Veer Narmad South Gujarat University (mail).
The story behind the discovery is unusual, Zeeshan said.
Virendar, a teacher student, returned home in Chamba because of the Kuncian.
He explored his backyard, photographed and uploaded pictures of what he found on Instagram.
They put snake images, lizards, frogs and insects.
“I saw one of these pictures in his search bait and discussed the photo with Harshil.
I then contacted Virendar and asked about the snake, belonging to a group of snakes commonly called Kukri when they covered curved teeth like Nepal Daggia Kukri.
Found Virendar is similar to the General Kukri Snake (Arnensis Oligodon), but is different in several aspects, “Zeeshan said.
The photo was uploaded by Virendar on June 5, 2020, and after extensively surveying the area at the end of the month, he found two sufficient snakes to start their identification.
The work was delayed because the laboratory did not function for a long time and visit the natural history museum was not possible.
After the laboratory returns to work, molecular data (DNA) for the resulting species that confirms that the species is different from common Kukri snakes.
A joint paper was filed in the first week of August 202 and was published in the recent edition of the international journal evolutionary system.
The new species have been named Oligodon Churahensis, after the Churah Valley at Himachal Pradesh.
Instagram post leads to the discovery of snake species
