maryanne27
Avid Member
I'm late to the party here, but this is an extremely entertaining thread! I'm so happy for you @jpowell86 and your beautiful cham. Absolutely gorgeous and beyond cool!!!
Take a guess
- Thread starter jpowell86
- Start date
Chris Anderson
Dr. House of Chameleons
The original split of the Calumma brevicorne group (Raxworthy & Nussbaum 2006 - Copeia) included a dichotomous key for differentiating this group, including the six new species described in that paper. Unfortunately, since being published, we've learned that a lot of those characters given in the key are not diagnostic, that there is a lot of variation within some of them, and that some of those species may still represent species complexes with multiple undescribed taxa. There are a number of photographs that I identified shortly after that split based on the published key that, knowing what we know now, are clearly a different species than I originally thought. Shortly after that article was published, Glaw & Vences (2007) noted in their field guide that "A reliable distinction of females of brevicorne, amber and crypticum by external morphology is not possible at present, but the life colouration of each taxon is different." Unfortunately there really has not been another work published on the C. brevicorne group since that would clarify its taxonomy and identification, but we've learned that even the coloration can vary quite a bit as well. This has left most trying to piece things together with limited information. It will be very nice when another comprehensive review of the group is done, but there are a number of such groups that are in need! Glad you were able to get a good consensus on the ID of these guys, Joel!
Chris
Chris
jpowell86
Chameleon Enthusiast
Great info, Chris. Thanks again for your help in the matter.
I find it exciting that there is still much to know about the brevicorne group. One of the professionals I was talking to said this is the same issue they are facing with the Calumma nasutum group.
I was recently reading an article written by David Protzel on Zootaxa. It describes the benefits of micro-CT scans and their use to delineate morphological and osteological characteristics between Calumma boettgeri and Calumma linotum. So couldn't this also help in differentiating the characteristics in the brevicorne-clade? Just curious about your thoughts. The issues are the same between the two groups, correct....just morphological variations? It was also explained to me that they are finding the same species having different appearances in different locations. Crypticum being the example in the conversation. Very interesting to me.
GCash
Avid Member
You didn't tell me you had a male lined up! I want to see the colors of that boy in better lighting for sure. He looks very promising. I'll text you about my female we talked about...about.......about.
Chris Anderson
Dr. House of Chameleons
Yeah, micro-CT scans could help, but it would take quite a large number of them combined with genetic and locality data to sort it out. The work David is doing on the C. nasutum group is a great example of one of these groups that, like the C. brevicorne group, needs a lot of work. Fortunately he seems to be making good progress with them!
Chris
