The Hindu Business Line : New legless amphibian

MUMBAI: Bombay Natural History Society's Varad Giri and his four-man team have identified a new caecilian (legless amphibian) and named it Indotyphlus maharashtraensis, based on a series of 12 specimens from the northern Western Ghats.

Dr David J. Gower and Dr Mark Wilkinson of the Department of Zoology, The Natural History Museum, London, have confirmed the findings.

In 2003, Giri was the first to come across a rare caecilian in the Western Ghats and named it Gegeneophis danieli. A research assistant at the Bombay Natural History Society, Giri has been intensely surveying the Western Ghats to locate fresh species.

The first female Indotyphlus maharashtraensis was collected near Dhanagarwada, in Satara district, by Giri and his team on June 19. The specimen was found on a plateau under a rock in an open patch of grass in semi-evergreen forest.

Before Giri, the last specimen was reported from Khandala in the 1960s and named Indotyphlus batterbsyi. More work can be done if additional funding was put in place, Giri said and added, "Caecilian research is not fashionable though it tells a lot about the ecology."