North American Recent Soft-Shelled Turtles (Family Trionychidae)Webb, Robert G. (Robert Gravem)
Science
North American Recent Soft-Shelled Turtles (Family Trionychidae)
Webb, Robert G. (Robert Gravem)
Soft-shelled turtles
_Paratypes._--Forty-two specimens: TU 481, 490, 678 (hatchlings), TU
381, 472, 488 (immature males), TU 475, 478, 486, 1232, 1291, 10170
(adult males), TU 399, 487 (immature females), TU 469 (adult female),
Caddo Lake, Caddo Parish, Louisiana; TU 15818 (immature male), TU
15819 (adult male), Cross Lake, Caddo Parish, Louisiana; TU 1253,
13211 (adult males), TU 13266 (immature female), Sabine River, 8 miles
southwest Merryville, Beauregard Parish, Louisiana; TU 13281-82 (adult
males), TU 13280, 13265 (immature females), TU 13303-04, 13306 (adult
females), Sabine River, 8 miles southwest Negreet, Sabine Parish,
Louisiana; SM 2375 (adult male), Wallace Bayou, De Soto Parish,
Louisiana; TU 1122 (adult male), Lacassine Refuge, Louisiana; UMMZ
92754 (adult male), 5 miles west Iowa, Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana; KU
40174-76, OU 27297 (adult males), OU 27290 (immature female), Lake
Texoma, 2 mi. E Willis, Marshall County, Oklahoma; KU 50832
(hatchling), mouth of Caney Creek, 4 miles southwest Kingston,
Marshall County, Oklahoma; CNHM 15474 (immature female), Kiowa County,
Oklahoma; KU 2966-67 (immature females), KU 2934, 2947 (adult males),
KU 2973 (adult female) Lewisville, Lafayette County, Arkansas.
_Description of holotype._--Carapace circular, widest at level of
posterior edge of hyoplastra; margin entire; dorsal surface
"sandpapery" to touch; pale rim separated from ground color of
carapace by well-defined, slightly ragged, blackish line; pale rim
approximately 2.1 times wider posteriorly (4.7 mm.) than it is
laterally (2.2 mm.); pale rim increasingly narrower anteriorly, absent
in nuchal region; tubercles along anterior edge of carapace triangular
with sharp tips becoming flattened and inconspicuous at level of
insertions of arms; ground color of carapace brownish having pattern
of small whitish tubercles; most whitish tubercles inconspicuous, of
pinpoint size, giving surface of carapace "sandpapery" effect; largest
white tubercles posteriorly, approximately 1.2 millimeters in
diameter; whitish tubercles smaller anteriorly, largest approximately
0.6 millimeters in diameter; whitish tubercles tend to form two
parallel lines coincident with longitudinal sutures of neurals
posteriorly in center of carapace; certain features of bony carapace
evident through overlying skin; carapace highest in region of third
and fourth neurals, forming obtuse, gently sloping, vertebral keel;
undersurface of rear margin of carapace whitish having pinkish tinge
and no markings; maximum length, 16.8 centimeters; greatest width,
14.3 centimeters.
Plastral surface extending slightly farther forward than carapace,
whitish having pinkish tinge and no dark markings; anterior and
posterior lobes rounded, posterior lobe more acutely; certain features
of bony elements of plastron visible through overlying skin; maximum
length, 12.2 centimeters.
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