Flat-snouted Wolf Snake

About the Flat-snouted Wolf Snake

Lycophidion depressirostre, commonly known as the flat-snouted wolf snake, is a rare species of oviparous, nonvenomous snake in the family Lamprophiidae. It is found in southern Sudan, the Central African Republic, Somalia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Southern Ethiopia.

This small snake appears dark brown, dark grey, or black. It has a round snout with an ill-defined pale band that breaks behind the eye. The head tends to be a lighter red-brown compared to the rest of the body. They may be meagerly stippled with white at the distal half of each dorsal scale, but the ventrum is uniformly dark. The only exceptions may be some pale stippling on the chin and lateral sides of the ventral scales.

They can reach a maximum length of 332 millimetres (13.1 in) in males and 448 millimetres (17.6 in) in females. As their namesake suggests, they have a very elongate skull, with strongly developed and smoothly curved parietal crests which merge posteriorly.

They are frequently misidentified as others in Lycophidion, but there are ways to differentiate. Lycophidion depressirostre has a single apical pit on its dorsal scales, unlike L... Wikipedia →