Box turtle systematics update

[Kapidolo Farms]

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1055790313001073#

 

[Yvonne G]

Oh man! I hate wading through scientific stuff. Someone please break it down for me.

 

[diamondbp]

Thanks Will. I've been hearing about some upcoming changes but I couldn't find the material on it.

 

[lutinorob]

Thanks that was very informative.

 

[WilliamB]

Oh man! I hate wading through scientific stuff. Someone please break it down for me.

Here is a break down:

• Terrapene ornata ornata and T. o. luteola shows no genetic important difference and should be considered the same subspecies.
• T. c. triunguis (Three-toed box turtle) is to be considered a separate species (suggested name Terrapene mexicana) and not a subspecies of T. carolina due to a higher than 2% genetic difference between the species. The Mexican box turtle, T. carolina mexicana and Yucatán box turtle, T. carolina yucatana should be considered sub-species of the new Terrapene mexicana and should be called T. m. mexicana and T. m. yucatana respectively.
• Terrapene nelsoni was confirmed to be the sister taxon of T. ornata. Ie they are very closely related but still separate species.
• The study was not able to produce any conclusive results for T. carolina bauri, T. c. major, and T. coahuila

Taken from a text I wrote for my site.

 

[Yvonne G]

Thank you, WilliamB.

 

[diamondbp]

Oh man! I hate wading through scientific stuff. Someone please break it down for me.

Here is a break down:

• Terrapene ornata ornata and T. o. luteola shows no genetic important difference and should be considered the same subspecies.
• T. c. triunguis (Three-toed box turtle) is to be considered a separate species (suggested name Terrapene mexicana) and not a subspecies of T. carolina due to a higher than 2% genetic difference between the species. The Mexican box turtle, T. carolina mexicana and Yucatán box turtle, T. carolina yucatana should be considered sub-species of the new Terrapene mexicana and should be called T. m. mexicana and T. m. yucatana respectively.
• Terrapene nelsoni was confirmed to be the sister taxon of T. ornata. Ie they are very closely related but still separate species.
• The study was not able to produce any conclusive results for T. carolina bauri, T. c. major, and T. coahuila

Taken from a text I wrote for my site.

Of course the two subspecies I was most interested in were left inconclusive. Dangit lol