''Geotrypetes angeli'' is a species of

amphibian Amphibians are ectothermic, anamniote, anamniotic, tetrapod, four-limbed vertebrate animals that constitute the class (biology), class Amphibia. In its broadest sense, it is a paraphyletic group encompassing all Tetrapod, tetrapods, but excl ...

in the family

Dermophiidae The Dermophiidae are a family of neotropical caecilians. They are found in Central and South America, and Africa. Like other caecilians, they superficially resemble worms or snakes. They are the only viviparous caecilians (species that give bi ...

. It is only known from

Labé Labé ( Pular: 𞤂𞤢𞤦𞤫) is the main city and administrative capital of the Fouta Djallon region of Guinea. It has a population of about 200,000. It is the second largest city in the country after the capital Conakry in terms of economic i ...

—the type locality which could refer to several places in

Guinea Guinea, officially the Republic of Guinea, is a coastal country in West Africa. It borders the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Guinea-Bissau to the northwest, Senegal to the north, Mali to the northeast, Côte d'Ivoire to the southeast, and Sier ...

—and from

Beyla, Guinea Beyla ( N’ko: ߓߋߟߊ߫) is a town and urban sub-prefecture located in south eastern Guinea. It is the capital of the Beyla prefecture of the Nzerekore region of Guinea. Population 13,204 (2008 est) Mining Dyula merchants established th ...

and Tingi Hills,

Sierra Leone Sierra Leone, officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered to the southeast by Liberia and by Guinea to the north. Sierra Leone's land area is . It has a tropical climate and envi ...

. Common name Angel's caecelian has been coined for this species.

Etymology

Hampton Wildman Parker Hampton Wildman Parker, CBE (5 July 1897 – 2 September 1968) was an English zoologist. Parker graduated from Cambridge in 1923 with degrees in botany, zoology, and chemistry. Within the same year, he joined the staff of the British Museum (Natu ...

named this species in honour of

Fernand Angel Fernand Angel (2 February 1881, Douzy – 13 July 1950, Paris) was a French herpetologist. In 1905 he began work as Assistant Preparator under Léon Vaillant and François Mocquard at the ''Muséum national d'histoire naturelle'' in Paris. Later ...

, a French zoologist and herpetologist from the

National Museum of Natural History The National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. With 4.4 ...

. Angel helped Parker to get access to specimens at the National Museum of Natural History that were included as

paratype In zoology and botany, a paratype is a specimen of an organism that helps define what the scientific name of a species and other taxon actually represents, but it is not the holotype (and in botany is also neither an isotype (biology), isotype ...

s in the

species description A species description is a formal scientific description of a newly encountered species, typically articulated through a scientific publication. Its purpose is to provide a clear description of a new species of organism and explain how it diff ...

Description

The

holotype A holotype (Latin: ''holotypus'') is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of s ...

, a mature female, measured in length and in width. The paratypes (3) are also females, the largest of which measured . The snout is rounded and prominent, with nostrils close to its tip. There are between 99 and 105 primary and 28 to 33 secondary folds. The holotype was pregnant with eight mature embryos.

Habitat and conservation

''Geotrypetes angeli'' is a little-known species. It is presumably

fossorial A fossorial animal () is one that is adapted to digging and which lives primarily (but not solely) underground. Examples of fossorial vertebrates are Mole (animal), moles, badgers, naked mole-rats, meerkats, armadillos, wombats, and mole salamand ...

, and probably lives in forests, or in fruit tree plantations, rural gardens, and secondary forests. ''

Geotrypetes seraphini ''Geotrypetes seraphini'', the Gaboon caecilian, is a species of amphibian in the family Dermophiidae. It is found in Cameroon, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ivory Coast, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone ...

'' is known to be

viviparous In animals, viviparity is development of the embryo inside the body of the mother, with the maternal circulation providing for the metabolic needs of the embryo's development, until the mother gives birth to a fully or partially developed juve ...

and not to dependent on water for breeding, and this might well apply to this species too. Threats to and population status of this species are unknown.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q1946333 angeli Amphibians of West Africa Amphibians described in 1936 Taxa named by Hampton Wildman Parker Taxonomy articles created by Polbot