Hiding in the lianas of the tree of life: Molecular phylogenetics and species delimitation reveal considerable cryptic diversity of New World Vine Snakes

A new vine snake (Reptilia, Colubridae, Oxybelis) from Peru and redescription of O. acuminatus

The Brown Vine Snake, Oxybelis aeneus, was until recently considered a single species, distributed from southern Arizona through the Neotropics into southeastern Brazil. However, newly conducted research restructured the species with a substantial taxonomic revision, recognizing five additional taxa (i.e. O. koehleri, O. microphthalmus, O. potosiensis, O. rutherfordi, O. vittatus) in this species complex. This revision focused on populations in North America, Central America, and northern South America while neglecting the southern portion of its distribution. Here, we examine the taxonomic history of the complex and use it along with specimen data to resurrect O. acuminatus from southeastern Brazil. Finally, we describe a new species from the Peruvian Amazon based on morphological characters. This work increases the species diversity of the O. aeneus complex to eight, and we expect further increases in biodiversity discoveries with continued exploration of the New World vine snakes.