Skip to main content Skip to main navigation menu Skip to site footer
Responsive image
Issue: Vol. 5875 No. 3: 4 Sept. 2026
Type: Article
Published: 2026-09-04
DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.5875.3.1
Page range: 201-224
Abstract views: 664
PDF downloaded: 34

A new species of wolf snake (Squamata: Colubridae: Dinodon) from southern Vietnam

Faculty of Biology-Biotechnology; University of Science; Ho Chi Minh City; 227 Nguyen Van Cu Street; Cho Quan Ward; Ho Chi Minh City; Vietnam; Institute of Life Sciences; Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology; 85; Tran Quoc Toan Street; Xuan Hoa Ward; Ho Chi Minh City; Vietnam
Kunming College of Life Science; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences; Kunming 650204; China; Institute of Life Sciences; Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology; 85; Tran Quoc Toan Street; Xuan Hoa Ward; Ho Chi Minh City; Vietnam
Faculty of Biology-Biotechnology; University of Science; Ho Chi Minh City; 227 Nguyen Van Cu Street; Cho Quan Ward; Ho Chi Minh City; Vietnam
Department of Biology; University of Science; Hue University; 77 Nguyen Hue St.; Hue City; Vietnam
Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Biology; Royal Ontario Museum; Toronto; Ontario M5S2C6; Canada
Yunnan Key Laboratory of Biodiversity and Ecological Conservation of Gaoligong Mountain; Kunming Institute of Zoology; Chinese Academy of Sciences; Kunming 650223; China; Southeast Asia Biodiversity Research Institute; Chinese Academy of Sciences; Yezin; Nay Pyi Taw 05282; Myanmar
Institute of Life Sciences; Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology; 85; Tran Quoc Toan Street; Xuan Hoa Ward; Ho Chi Minh City; Vietnam
Reptilia Lam Dong Province morphology mitochondrial DNA Dinodon fasciatus group Dinodon nuiongensis

Abstract

We describe a new species of wolf snake, genus Dinodon, from Lam Dong Province, southern Vietnam, based on morphological characters and molecular evidence from mitochondrial COI, Cytb, and 16S. Dinodon nuiongensis sp. nov. is diagnosed by the following combination of morphological features: a medium-sized species, reaching up to 630 mm in total length; 8 or 9 supralabials, with the third to fifth contacting the eye; 10 infralabials; a single loreal contacting the eye; 11 maxillary teeth; dorsal scale rows 17-17-15, with 7–11 keeled rows at neck and 9–11 at midbody; 210 or 211 ventrals; cloacal plate single; 74–82 paired subcaudals; hemipenis unforked, extending to the 8th or 9th subcaudal, with distal spinulate calyces, enlarged curved spines at middle part, and single sulcus spermaticus; and 19–23 and 11–14 cross-bands on the body and tail, respectively. The new species differs from its congeners by uncorrected p-distances of at least 8.9% for COI, 8.7% for Cytb, and 1.0% for 16S.

References

  1. Anderson, J. (1879) Reptilia collected on the two expeditions to western Yunnan. In: Anderson, J. Anatomical and Zoological Researches: Comprising an Account of the Zoological Results of the Two Expeditions to Western Yunnan in 1868 and 1875. Bernard Quarich, London, pp. 705–860.
  2. Bernstein, J.M., Austin, C.C., Soto-Centeno, J.A., Huang, T., Roberts, J.R., McGuire, J.A., Iskandar, D.T., Iova, B., Frederick, J.H., Sanguila, M.B., Weinell, J.L., Brown, R.M. & Ruane, S. (2026) Diversification and colonization in the Indo-Australian Archipelago: Genomic insights from colubrid snakes. Journal of Biogeography, 53, e70202. https://doi.org/10.1111/jbi.70202
  3. Boulenger, G.A. (1893) Catalogue of the snakes in the British Museum (Natural History). Vol. I. Taylor & Francis, London, 448 pp.
  4. Daltry, J.C. & Wüster, W. (2002) A new species of wolf snake (Serpentes: Colubridae: Lycodon) from the Cardamom Mountains, southwestern Cambodia. Herpetologica, 58 (4), 498–504. https://doi.org/10.1655/0018-0831(2002)058[0498:ANSOWS]2.0.CO;2
  5. Dowling, H.G. (1951) A proposed standard system of counting ventrals in snakes. British Journal of Herpetology, 1, 97–99.
  6. Dowling, H.G. & Savage, J.M. (1960) A guide to the snake hemipenis: A survey of basic structure and systematic characteristics. Zoologica, 45, 17–28. https://doi.org/10.5962/p.203350
  7. Figueroa, A., McKelvy, A.D., Grismer, L.L., Bell, C.D. & Lailvaux, S.P. (2016) A species-level phylogeny of extant snakes with description of a new colubrid subfamily and genus. PLoS One, 11, e0161070. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0161070
  8. Fitzinger, L.I. (1826) Neue Classification der Reptilien nach ihren natürlichen Verwandtschaften, nebst einer Verwandtschafts - Tafel und einem Verzeichnisse der Reptilien-Sammlung des k. k. zoolog. Museums zu Wien. J. G. Heubner, Wien, [12] + 61 pp., [11], 1 foldout pl. https://doi.org/10.5962/bhl.title.4683
  9. Folmer, O., Black, M., Hoeh, W., Lutz, R. & Vrijenhoek, R. (1994) DNA primers for amplification of mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I from diverse metazoan invertebrates. Molecular Marine Biology and Biotechnology, 3, 294–299. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0013102
  10. Gong, Y.A., Peng, L.F., Lu, S.Q. & Huang, S. (2019) The complete mitochondrial genome of Lycodon ruhstrati (Serpentes: Colubridae). Mitochondrial DNA Part B, 2, 2165–2166. https://doi.org/10.1080/23802359.2019.1623730
  11. Guo, P., Zhang, L., Liu, Q., Li, C., Pyron, R.A., Jiang, K. & Burbrink, F.T. (2013) Lycodon or Dinodon: One genus or two? Evidence from molecular phylogenetics and morphological comparisons. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 68, 144–149. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ympev.2013.03.008
  12. Hillis, D.M. & Bull, J.J. (1993) An empirical test of bootstrapping as a method for assessing confidence in phylogenetic analysis. Systematic Biology, 42, 182–192. https://doi.org/10.1093/sysbio/42.2.182
  13. Hoang, D.T., Chernomor, O., von Haeseler, A., Minh, B.Q. & Vinh, L.S. (2018) UFBoot2: Improving the ultrafast bootstrap approximation. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 35, 518–522. https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msx281
  14. Indahsari, L.I.N., Fatchiyah, F. & Kurniawan, N. (2019) DNA barcoding as a method for species identification: Case study in Ahaetulla snake. Journal of Physics: Conference Series, 1374, 012011. https://doi.org/10.1088/1742-6596/1374/1/012011
  15. Janssen, H.Y., Pham, C.T., Ngo, H.T., Le, M.D., Nguyen, T.Q. & Ziegler, T. (2019) A new species of Lycodon Boie, 1826 (Serpentes, Colubridae) from northern Vietnam. ZooKeys, 875, 1–29. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.875.35933
  16. Janssen, H.Y., Ren, J.L., Li, J.T., Wang, Z., Nguyen, T.T., Nguyen, T.Q., Bui, Q.T.T., Ngo, H.T., Le, M.D. & Ziegler, T. (2020) Rang extension and extended diagnosis of Lycodon pictus: First country record from China. Revue Suisse de Zoologie, 127, 413–422. https://doi.org/10.35929/RSZ.0030
  17. Kocher, T.D., Thomas, W.K., Meyer, A., Edwards, S.V., Pääbo, S., Villablanca, F.X. & Wilson, A.C. (1989) Dynamics of mitochondrial DNA evolution in animals: Amplification and sequencing with conserved primers. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 86, 6196–6200. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.86.16.6196
  18. Kumar, S., Stecher, G. & Tamura, K. (2016) MEGA7: molecular evolutionary genetics analysis version 7.0 for bigger datasets. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 33, 1870–1874. https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msw054
  19. Laopichienpong, N., Muangmai, N., Supikamolseni, A., Twilprawat, P., Chanhome, L., Suntrarachun, S., Peyachoknagul, S. & Srikulnathe, K. (2016) Assessment of snake DNA barcodes based on mitochondrial COI and Cytb genes revealed multiple putative cryptic species in Thailand. Gene, 594, 238–247. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gene.2016.09.017
  20. Lei, J., Sun, X., Jiang, K., Vogel, G., Booth, D. & Ding, L. (2014) Multilocus phylogeny of Lycodon and the taxonomic revision of Oligodon multizonatum. Asian Herpetological Research, 5, 26–37. https://doi.org/10.3724/SP.J.1245.2014.00026
  21. Li, J., Liang, D., Wang, Y., Guo, P., Huang, S. & Zhang, P. (2020) A large-scale systematic framework of Chinese snakes based on a unified multilocus marker system. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 148, 106807. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ympev.2020.106807
  22. Liu, S., Hou, M., Cai, B., Li, S., Zhang, Z. & Yu, R. (2023) Taxonomic status of Lycodon subcinctus sensu lato in China (Serpentes, Colubridae). Herpetozoa, 36, 307–316. https://doi.org/10.3897/herpetozoa.36.e114206
  23. Luu, V.Q., Bonkowski, M., Nguyen, T.Q., Le, M.D., Calame, T. & Ziegler, T. (2018) A new species of Lycodon Boie, 1826 (Serpentes: Colubridae) from central Laos. Revue suisse de Zoologie, 125 (2), 263–276. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1414220
  24. Luu, V.Q., Ziegler, T., Ha, N.V., Le, M.D. & Hoang, T.T. (2019) A new species of Lycodon Boie, 1826 (Serpentes: Colubridae) from Thanh Hoa Province, Vietnam. Zootaxa, 4586 (2), 261–277. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4586.2.3
  25. Lyu, B., Li, Q., Li, K.E., Li, L., Shu, F.U., Wu, Y. & Guo, P. (2022) Expanded morphological description of the recently described Lycodon zayuensis (Serpentes: Colubridae). Zootaxa, 5213 (2), 159–168. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5213.2.4
  26. Minh, Q., Nguyen, M.A.T. & von Haeseler, A. (2013) Ultrafast approximation for phylogenetic bootstrap. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 30, 1188–1195. https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/mst024
  27. Neang, T., Hartmann, T., Hun, S., Souter, N.J. & Furey, N.M. (2014) A new species of wolf snake (Colubridae: Lycodon Fitzinger, 1826) from Phnom Samkos Wildlife Sanctuary, Cardamom Mountains, southwest Cambodia. Zootaxa, 3814 (1), 68–80. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.3814.1.3
  28. Nguyen, A.T, Duong, T.V, Wood, P.L. & Grismer, L.L. (2022) Two new syntopic species of wolf snakes (genus Lycodon H. Boie in Fitzinger, 1826) from an imperiled ecosystem in the Song Giang River Valley of southern Vietnam (Squamata: Colubridae). Vertebrate Zoology, 72, 371–384. https://doi.org/10.3897/vz.72.e82201
  29. Nguyen, L.T., Schmidt, H.A., von Haeseler, A. & Minh, B.Q. (2015) IQ-TREE: A fast and effective stochastic algorithm for estimating maximum likelihood phylogenies. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 32, 268–274. https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msu300
  30. Nguyen, S.V., Ho, C.T. & Nguyen, T.Q. (2009) Herpetofauna of Vietnam. Chimaira, Frankfurt, 768 pp.
  31. Nguyen, T.V., David, P. & Vogel, G. (2024a) Expanded description & range extension of Lycodon sidiki Wostl, Hamidy, Kurniawan & Smith, 2017 (Squamata: Colubridae: Lycodon). Zootaxa, 5492 (4), 563–581. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5492.4.5
  32. Nguyen, T.V., Le, J.L., Jiang, K., Ding, L., May Thu Chit, Poyarkov, N.A. & Vogel, G. (2025b) A new species of wolf snake Lycodon Fitzinger, 1826 from China and Myanmar (Squamata: Colubridae), and new data on Lycodon gongshan Vogel & Luo, 2011. Zootaxa, 5621 (1), 1–51. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5621.1.1
  33. Nguyen, T.V., Lee, J.T., Pauwels, O.S.G., Kennedy-Gold, S.R., Poyarkov, N.A., David, P. & Vogel, G. (2024b) The nomenclatural status of Anoplophallus maculatus Cope, 1895, with implications in the taxonomy of Lycodon subcinctus F. Boie, 1827 auctorum (Squamata: Colubridae) and the description of a new species. Zootaxa, 5519 (4), 487–537. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5519.4.2
  34. Nguyen, T.V., Poyarkov, N.A. & Vogel, G. (2025a) Taxonomic reassessment of the Lycodon rufozonatus species complex (Serpentes: Colubridae), with re-evaluation of Dinodon rufozonatum walli and description of a new species from northcentral Vietnam. ZooKeys, 1251, 293–322. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1251.157817
  35. Nguyen, T.V. & Vogel, G. (2025) A new species of Lycodon Fitzinger, 1826 from the Northern part of the Truong Son Mountains, Central Vietnam (Reptilia, Squamata, Colubridae). Zootaxa, 5570 (3), 484–510. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5570.3.3
  36. Nylander, J.A.A. (2004) MrModeltest v2. Program distributed by the author. Evolutionary Biology Centre, Uppsala University.
  37. Phan, K.D., Hoang, H.D., Le, M.V., Murphy, R.W., Che, J. & Nguyen, S.N. (2025) Expanded description and range extension of Lycodon truongi Nguyen, Duong, Wood et Grismer, 2022 (Serpentes: Colubridae). Russian Journal of Herpetology, 32 (4), 315–320. https://doi.org/10.30906/1026-2296-2025-32-4-315-320
  38. Ronquist, R.R. & Huelsenbeck, J.P. (2003) MrBayes 3: Bayesian phylogenetic inference under mixed models. Bioinformatics, 19, 1572–1574. https://doi.org/10.1093/bioinformatics/btg180
  39. Simmons, J.E. (2002) Herpetological collecting and collections management. Revised edition. Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles, Herpetological Circular, 31, 1–153.
  40. Slowinski, J.B., Pawar, S.S., Win, H., Thin, T. & Gyi, S.W. (2001) A new Lycodon (Serpentes: Colubridae) from Northeast India and Myanmar (Burma). Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences, 52 (20), 397–405.
  41. Smith, M.A. (1943) The fauna of British India, Ceylon and Burma, including the whole of the Indo-chinese subregion. Reptilia and Amphibia. Vol. III. Serpentes. Taylor and Francis, London, xii + 583 pp.
  42. Thompson, J.D., Higgins, D.G. & Gibson, T.J. (1994) CLUSTAL W: improving the sensitivity of progressive multiple sequence alignment through sequence weighting, position-specific gap penalties and weight matrix choice. Nucleic Acids Research, 22, 4673–4680. https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/22.22.4673
  43. Trifinopoulos, J., Nguyen, L.T., von Haeseler, A. & Minh, B.Q. (2016) W-IQ-TREE: a fast online phylogenetic tool for maximum likelihood analysis. Nucleic Acids Research, 44, W232–W235. https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkw256
  44. Uetz, P., Freed, P. & Hošek, J. (2026) The Reptile Database. Available from: https://www.reptiledatabase.reptarium.cz/ (accessed 2 February 2026)
  45. Vogel, G., Bragin, A.M., Poyarkov, N.A. & Nguyen, T.A. (2025) A new limestone-associated species of wolf snake in the Lycodon fasciatus complex (Squamata: Serpentes: Colubridae) from central Vietnam. Zootaxa, 5679 (1), 1–44. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5679.1.1
  46. Vogel, G. & David, P. (2010) A new species of the genus Lycodon (Boie, 1826) from Yunnan Province, China (Serpentes: Colubridae). Bonn zoological bulletin, 57, 289–296.
  47. Vogel, G. & David, P. (2019) A new species of the Lycodon fasciatus complex from the Khorat Plateau, eastern Thailand (Reptiles, Squamata, Colubridae). Zootaxa, 4577 (3), 515–528. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4577.3.6
  48. Vogel, G., David, P., Pauwels O.S.G., Sumontha M., Norval G., Hendrix R., Vu, N.T. & Ziegler, T. (2009) A revision of Lycodon ruhstrati (Fischer 1886) auctorum (Squamata Colubridae), with the description of a new species from Thailand and a new subspecies from the Asian mainland. Tropical Zoology, 22, 131–182.
  49. Vogel, G., Liu, S., David, P. & Nguyen, T.V. (2024) Solving of the long-term question: resurrection of Dinodon yunnanensis Werner, 1922 (Squamata: Colubridae: Lycodon). Zootaxa, 5551 (2), 201–241. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5551.2.1
  50. Vogel, G. & Luo, J. (2011) A new species of the genus Lycodon (Boie, 1826) from the southwestern mountains of China (Squamata: Colubridae). Zootaxa, 2807 (1), 29–40. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.2807.1.2
  51. Vogel, G., Nguyen, T.Q., Kingsada, P. & Ziegler, T. (2012) A new species of the genus Lycodon Boie 1826 from Laos (Squamata, Colubridae). North-western journal of zoology, 8, 344–352.
  52. Wang, J., Qi, S., Lyu, Z.T., Zeng, Z.C. & Wang, Y.Y. (2020) A new species of the genus Lycodon (Serpentes, Colubridae) from Guangxi, China. ZooKeys, 954 (4), 85–108. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.954.53432
  53. Wang, K., Yu, Z.B., Vogel, G. & Che, J. (2021) Contribution to the taxonomy of the genus Lycodon H. Boie in Fitzinger, 1827 (Reptilia: Squamata: Colubridae) in China, with description of two new species and resurrection and elevation of Dinodon septentrionale chapaense Angel, Bourret, 1933. Zoological Research, 42 (1), 62–86. https://doi.org/10.24272/j.issn.2095-8137.2020.286
  54. Zaher, H. (1999) Hemipenial morphology of the South American Xenodontine snakes, with a proposal for a monophyletic Xenodontinae and a reappraisal of colubroid hemipenes. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 240, 1–168.
  55. Zhang, J., Jiang, K., Vogel, G. & Rao, D.Q. (2011) A new species of the genus Lycodon (Squamata, Colubridae) from Sichuan Province, China. Zootaxa, 2982 (1), 59–68. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.2982.1.6

How to Cite

Phan, K.D., Le, M.V., Hoang, H.D., Vo, B.D., Murphy, R.W., Che, J. & Nguyen, S.N. (2026) A new species of wolf snake (Squamata: Colubridae: Dinodon) from southern Vietnam. Zootaxa, 5875 (3), 201–224. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5875.3.1