New Guinea Water Python
Katrinus fuscus cornwallisius (Gunther,
1879).
This is the New Guinea form of the Water Python. The type locality is Dauan (as Cornwallis) Island, Torres Strait. The mountain on the island is called Cornwallis Peak. This Island is immediately adjacent to the low-lying Sambai Island which is in turn immediately adjacent to the southern New Guinea coast. The fauna on this Island is clearly derived from New Guinea, with which it was joined in the recent geological past. Therefore it is also clear that the Water Pythons here are of the same stock as those specimens found on the adjacent New Guinea mainland.
The subspecies can be separated from the mainland Australian form by its generally darker dorsal body colour (in life) and by analysis of its mitochondrial DNA.
The above was from the paper - A revision of the Australiasian Pythons.
(Originally published in Ophidia Review 1(1) in "Autumn" 2000 - (Publication date: October 2000), pp. 7-27).
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