Meso-American slider

Species of turtle

Mesoamerican Slider (Trachemys venusta cataspila), Municipality of Ocampo, Tamaulipas, Mexico (22 September 2004).

The Meso-American slider (Trachemys venusta)^[1][2] is a species of turtle belonging to the family Emydidae. The species is distributed from Mexico to Colombia.^[2]

Geographic range

The species Trachemys venusta is found from southeastern Mexico to northwestern Colombia.^[1]

• Trachemys venusta venusta – Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico in the states of Campeche, Chiapas, Oaxaca, Quintana Roo, Tabasco, Veracruz, and Yucatán
• Trachemys venusta cataspila – Mexico in the states of San Luis Potosí, Tamaulipas, and Veracruz
• Trachemys venusta grayi – El Salvador, Guatemala and Mexico in the states of Chiapas and Oaxaca

The following three new subspecies were described in 2010.

• Trachemys venusta iversoni – Mexico in the state of Yucatán
• Trachemys venusta panamensis – Panama
• Trachemys venusta uhrigi – Costa Rica, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, and Colombia in the departments of Antioquia and Chocó

Subspecies

• Trachemys venusta venusta (Gray, 1856) – Belize slider ^[1][2]
• Trachemys venusta cataspila (Günther, 1885) – Huastecan slider^[1][2]
• Trachemys venusta grayi (Bocourt, 1868) – Gray's slider^[1][2]
• Trachemys venusta iversoni McCord, Joseph-Ouni, Hagen & Blanck, 2010 – Yucatán slider^[1]
• Trachemys venusta panamensis McCord, Joseph-Ouni, Hagen & Blanck, 2010 – Panamanian slider^[1]
• Trachemys venusta uhrigi McCord, Joseph-Ouni, Hagen & Blanck, 2010 – Uhrig's slider^[1]

Nota bene: A trinomial authority in parentheses indicates that the subspecies was originally described in a genus other than Trachemys.

Etymology

The subspecific name, grayi, is in honor of British herpetologist John Edward Gray.^[4]

References

1. Rhodin 2010, p. 000.104
2. Fritz 2007, pp. 210–211
3. Fritz, Uwe; Havaš, Peter (2007). "Checklist of Chelonians of the World". Vertebrate Zoology. 57 (2): 210–211. doi:10.3897/vz.57.e30895. S2CID 87809001.
4. Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. ISBN 978-1-4214-0135-5. (Trachemys venusta grayi, p. 107).

Bibliography

• Rhodin, Anders G.J.; van Dijk, Peter Paul; Iverson, John B.; Shaffer, H. Bradley (2010-12-14). "Turtles of the World 2010 Update: Annotated Checklist of Taxonomy, Synonymy, Distribution and Conservation Status" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-17. Retrieved 2010-12-15.
• Fritz, Uwe; Havaš, Peter (2007-10-31). "Checklist of Chelonians of the World" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-05-01. Retrieved 2010-12-29.

Further reading

• Campbell, Jonathan A. (1998). Amphibians and Reptiles of Northern Guatemala, the Yucatán, and Belize. Norman, Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press. 400 pp. ISBN 0-8061-3064-4. pp. 114–115 (online copy, p. 114, at Google Books).

External links

• Data related to Trachemys venusta at Wikispecies