Meeting Abstract
Snake skulls are typically analyzed as a whole but are rarely found complete in the fossil record, as snakes have highly kinetic skulls that separate quickly post-mortem. In this study, we compared the basioccipital, frontal, and compound bone of 24 species across four families and nine genera to discover whether individual cranial bones can be differentiated and to what taxonomic level. When comparing cranial bones individually, results showed dramatic differences at the family level for all three bone types. For the basiocciptial, lacking a crest or a weakly developed crest and wide anterior arc are characteristic of Pythonidae, a large sweeping crest and laterally narrow shape are characteristic of Viperidae, a weakly developed trilobate crest is typical of Colubridae, and a moderately-developed trilobate crest and lateral spines are typical of Natricidae. For the frontal, Pythonidae has a trapezoidal shape, Viperidae has a roughly square shape, Colubridae has a rectangular shape, and Natricidae has a well-developed medial process and a rectangular shape. For the compound bone, the arch of the shaft and multiple processes, among other characters, are informative. At the generic level, there appears to be potential for making identifications, however, certain genera are strikingly divergent from species to species, such as the Natricines. When comparing isolated cranial bones at the species-level, preliminary results suggest there is too much variance and/or similarity to obtain an accurate identification. Snake cranial bones display a wide array of forms and it appears promising that, like snake vertebrae, generic-level identifications are possible, but more research is needed to determine intraspecific variation and expand upon the cranial bones selected here.
