Molecular phylogeny of Tornier's cat snake (Crotaphopeltis tornieri), endemic to East African mountain forests: biogeography, vicariance events and problematic species boundaries

Five isolated populations of the East African snake species Crotaphopeltis tornieri were investigated using mitochondrial sequence data from the genes cytochrome B and NADH2. The congeneric species Crotaphopeltis hotamboeia and three species of the closely related genera Dipsadoboa were used as outgroups. The results were analysed using unweighted parsimony and the reconstructed phylogeny revealed four well-defined evolutionarily significant units. Very high levels of genetic diversity was observed. The highest levels of divergence was observed between specimens from Mount Rungwe and the remaining populations. A similar pattern but with much lower divergence levels has been observed for the bird species Andropadus masukuensis . Together they indicate that Mt Rungwe is an important area for future conservation efforts. In the analysis of the combined data set C. tornieri appear as non-monophyletic with C. hotamboeia being the sister group to all C. tornieri populations except those on Mt Rungwe. The validity of C. tornieri and C. hotamboeia as species was thereby questioned by the data. However, the support for this is very weak and no nomenclatural consequences are suggested at present.