|
|
||||||||
|
TIMOR-LESTE 2011
Victor Valley College Tropical Research Initiative Same & Trilolo River, Manufahi District We visited Same in 2009 - click here to visit those pages
Once settled into the Ailelehun Guest House we made a nocturnal visit to the Trilolo River, where in 2009 we had collected a number of frogs and geckos, including two specimens of an undescribed Bent-toed gecko (Cyrtodactylus sp.). In 2011 however, the rain was heavy and unremitting, which made walking down to the river treacherous.
Mark was in the lead and he came across a large blindsnake climbing up the mossy-covered sand of the cliff bordering the track. Too large for a Brahminy blindsnake (Ramphotyphlops braminus), this specimen was clearly the Timor blindsnake (R. polygrammicus polygrammicus) a secretive species known from the Lesser Sundas and southern New Guinea and the first specimen Mark had seen since working in the Trans-Fly region of Western Province, Papua New Guinea in 1986. As luck would have it, due to the rain this was the only specimen we collected on the Trilolo River in 2011, other species recorded but not collected being Asian black-spined toad (Duttaphrynus melanostictus), Common house gecko (Hemidactylus frenatus) and Tokay gecko (Gekko gecko) calling in the trees over the river, about the only sound audible over the rain and the river itself.
Around the Ailelehun Guest House in Same we also found Common house geckos, while there were several Timor flying lizards (Draco timoriensis) on the coconut palms to the rear of the hotel. We also noted a small Australasian forest scorpion (Liocheles australasiae) under debris behind the accommodations, a species different from the buthid Bark scorpions (Lychas mucronatus) that we painfully encountered before.
|
||||||||||||||||||||
