A new species of African legless skink, genus Acontias Cuvier, 1816 “1817” (Squamata: Scincidae) from Serra da Neve inselberg, south-western Angola

Abstract

ABSTRACTDuring a recent survey of the Serra da Neve inselberg in south-western Angola, a population of legless skinks of the genus Acontias was found. Only three species of this genus have been recorded for the country so far – A. occidentalis, A. kgalagadi and A. jappi. Using an integrative approach and combining molecular and morphological data we found that the Serra da Neve population represents a new species, closely related to species such as A. percivali and some members of the A. occidentalis species complex. In this paper, we describe this population as a new species, Acontias mukwando sp. nov. and provide brief comments on its conservation and biogeography.RESUMONo decorrer de um levantamento herpetológico da ilha-montanha da Serra da Neve no sudoeste de Angola, descobriu-se uma população de escincos-lança do género Acontias. Apenas três espécies deste género foram até agora registadas para Angola - A. occidentalis, A. kgalagadi and A. jappi. Adotando uma abordagem integrativa e combinando dados morfológicos e moleculares, os nossos resultados indicam que a população da Serra da Neve representa uma nova espécie, com relações próximas a outras espécies rupícolas tais como A. percivali e membros do complexo de espécies A. occidentalis. Neste artigo descrevemos esta população como uma nova espécie, Acontias mukwando sp. nov. e apresentamos breves comentários sobre a sua conservação e biogeografia.KEYWORDS: Acontinaetaxonomyendemismspeciationsystematics AcknowledgementsThe present work is a result of the ongoing collaboration between the Instituto Nacional de Biodiversidade e Áreas de Conservação (INBAC) from the Ministry of Environment of Angola and its international partners. Angolan specimens were collected and exported under permits issued by INBAC (65/INBAC.MINAMB/2022). We also thank the provincial and local authorities for their support and cooperation during our fieldwork. We thank Adam Ferguson, Ben Marks and Daryl Coldren for their support during fieldwork. Special thanks to Álvaro (Varito) Baptista and his team from Omahua Lodge, for all the assistance, great support, and friendship during the fieldwork. Luis Querido and João Serôdio de Almeida provided critical support for the success of this expedition. Werner Conradie, Harith Farooq and an anonymous reviewer are thanked for their important suggestions on the improvement of the manuscript.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Additional informationFundingThis work was funded by the National Geographic Society Explorer Grant (NGS-73084R-20) to LMPC. DP is supported by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT) grant (2021.05238.BD). MPM was supported by FCT grants (SFRH/BD/129924/2017, COVID/BD/152155/2022). Work co-funded by the project NORTE-01-0246-FEDER-000063, supported by Norte Portugal Regional Operational Programme (NORTE2020), under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). AMB was supported by grant DEB 2146654 from the US National Science Foundation.