Search tool	Example of search string in box	What that means to the database
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	Hyl*	Will find all uses of "Hyl . . ." anywhere in a record: e.g., Hylarana, Hyla, Hylidae, Hylinae, Hylaedactyla.
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	*Hyla	Will find all uses of ". . . hyla" anywhere in a record: e.g., Hyla, Hylidae, Plectrohyla, Ptychadena hylaea, Adenomera hylaedactyla
	Hyla	Will find all records that contain stand-alone uses of Hyla: e.g., Hyla, Hyla arenicolor
Strings of words without quotation marks	Lithobates pipiens	Interprets this as "Lithobates OR pipiens" so will find the union of all records that contain either "Lithobates" or "pipiens": e.g., Lithobates omiltemanus, Hylorana pipiens
Strings of word with quotation marks	"Lithobates pipiens"	Interprets this as "Lithobates AND pipiens" so will return all records that have the character string "Lithobates pipiens" anywhere within a record: e.g., all members of the Lithobates pipiens complex.
AND statement. Means that the results of the search must include both words held together by an AND	Lithobates AND pipiens	Same as "Lithobates pipiens"
OR statement. Means that the results of the search will all records that have either of the terms held together by an OR	Lithobates OR "Costa Rica"	Recovers all records that contain the word "Lithobates" or "Costa Rica": 402 records inasmuch as this will include all records for the entire amphibian fauna of Costa Rica
Combining Boolean operators within the Basic Search box (AND, OR, NOT, quotation marks)	Lithobates AND "Costa Rica" NOT forreri	Recovers only records that contain the word Lithobates AND "Costa Rica", but excludes any record that contains the word "forreri" in any part of the record: 9 records
Printable HELP file

Search tool	Example of search string in box	What that means to the database
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	Hyl*	Will find all uses of "Hyl . . ." anywhere in a record: e.g., Hylarana, Hyla, Hylidae, Hylinae, Hylaedactyla.
* = "wildcard". Allows a partial letter string to be entered and implies either no or various extension on this letter string	*Hyla	Will find all uses of ". . . hyla" anywhere in a record: e.g., Hyla, Hylidae, Plectrohyla, Ptychadena hylaea, Adenomera hylaedactyla
Single word	Hyla	Will find all records that contain stand-alone uses of Hyla: e.g., Hyla, Hyla arenicolor
Strings of words without quotation marks	Lithobates pipiens	Interprets this as "Lithobates OR pipiens" so will find the union of all records that contain either "Lithobates" or "pipiens": e.g., Lithobates omiltemanus, Hylorana pipiens
Strings of word with quotation marks	"Lithobates pipiens"	Interprets this as "Lithobates AND pipiens" so will return all records that have the character string "Lithobates pipiens" anywhere within a record: e.g., all members of the Lithobates pipiens complex.
AND statement. Means that the results of the search must include both words held together by an AND	Lithobates AND pipiens	Same as "Lithobates pipiens"
OR statement. Means that the results of the search will all records that have either of the terms held together by an OR	Lithobates OR "Costa Rica"	Recovers all records that contain the word "Lithobates" or "Costa Rica": 402 records inasmuch as this will include all records for the entire amphibian fauna of Costa Rica
Combining Boolean operators within the Basic Search box (AND, OR, NOT, quotation marks)	Lithobates AND "Costa Rica" NOT forreri	Recovers only records that contain the word Lithobates AND "Costa Rica", but excludes any record that contains the word "forreri" in any part of the record: 9 records
Printable HELP file

Bolitoglossa occidentalis Taylor, 1941

Class: Amphibia > Order: Caudata > Family: Plethodontidae > Subfamily: Hemidactyliinae > Genus: Bolitoglossa > Species: Bolitoglossa occidentalis

Bolitoglossa occidentalis Taylor, 1941, Univ. Kansas Sci. Bull., 27: 145. Holotype: USNM 111085, by original designation. Type locality: "La Esperanza [near Escuintla], Chiapas, Mexico, elevation 500 feet". Tighe, 2022, Smithson. Contrib. Zool., 654: 23–24, noted the current location of paratypes.

Bolitoglossa bilineata Lynch and Smith, 1966, Trans. Kansas Acad. Sci., 69: 59. Holotype: UIMNH 56162, by original designation. Type locality: "Sierra Madre north of Zanatepec, Oaxaca, Mexico". Secondary homonym of Bolitoglossa bilineata Duméril, Bibron, and Duméril, 1854, Erp. Gen., 9: 91 (= Eurycea bislineata bislineata). Synonymy by Wake and Brame, 1969, Contrib. Sci. Nat. Hist. Mus. Los Angeles Co., 175: 28.

Bolitoglossa (Nanotriton) occidentalis — Parra-Olea, García-París, and Wake, 2004, Biol. J. Linn. Soc., 81: 335.

Common Names

Southern Banana Salamander (Liner, 1994, Herpetol. Circ., 23: 10; Frank and Ramus, 1995, Compl. Guide Scient. Common Names Amph. Rept. World: 30; Liner and Casas-Andreu, 2008, Herpetol. Circ., 38: 29).

La Esperanza Banana Salamander (Raffaëlli, 2022, Salamanders & Newts of the World: 670).

Distribution

Pacific slopes of southeastern Oaxaca and Chiapas, Mexico, southern Guatemala; also on the Atlantic versant in west-central Chiapas, Mexico, sea level to 2000 m elevation.

Geographic Occurrence

Natural Resident: Guatemala, Mexico

Comment

In the Bolitoglossa rufescens group, which now constitutes part of the subgenus Nanotriton according to Parra-Olea, García-París, and Wake, 2004, Biol. J. Linn. Soc., 81: 336. See account by McCranie and Wilson, 2002, Amph. Honduras: 124–126, who discuss literature and evidence supporting the existence of multiple species under this name. McCranie, 2007, Herpetol. Rev., 38: 36, summarized the departmental distribution in Honduras. Campbell, Smith, Streicher, Acevedo, and Brodie, 2010, Misc. Publ. Mus. Zool. Univ. Michigan, 200: 40, confirmed the distinctivenes of this species from Bolitoglossa rufescens and named species previously confused with this duo. Rovito, Parra-Olea, Vásquez-Almazán, Luna-Reyes, and Wake, 2012, BMC Evol. Biol., 12(255): 1–16, reported on molecular phylogeography. Köhler, 2011, Amph. Cent. Am.: 40–69, compared this species with others from Central America and provided a map and photograph. Raffaëlli, 2013, Urodeles du Monde, 2nd ed.: 315, provided a brief account, photograph, and map. Hess, Itgen, Firneno, Nifong, and Townsend, 2017, J. Zool. Syst. Evol. Res., 55: 150–155, suggested that previous records from Honduras are identifiable as Bolitoglossa nympha. Raffaëlli, 2022, Salamanders & Newts of the World: 670–671, provided an account summarizing systematics, life history, population status, and distribution (including a polygon map).

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For additional information see AmphibiaWeb report
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For information on distribution, habitat, and conservation see the Map of Life
For related information on conservation and images as well as observations see iNaturalist