Rhadinella hempsteadae, also known commonly as Hempstead's pine woods snake, is a species of snake in the subfamily Dipsadinae of the family Colubridae. The species is endemic to Guatemala.
Etymology The specific name, hempsteadae, is in honor of Guatemalan coffee planter Maria Luisa Hempstead.Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. . (Rhadinaea hempsteadae, p. 121).
Habitat The preferred natural habitat of R. hempsteadae is forest, at altitudes of .
Description The holotype of R. hempsteadae, an adult male, has a snout-to-vent length (SVL) of , plus a tail length of .Stuart LC, Bailey JR (1941).
Behavior R. hempsteadae is terrestrial and fossorial.
Reproduction R. hempsteadae is oviparous.
References
Further reading Köhler G (2008). Reptiles of Central America, 2nd Edition. (With a foreword by Larry David Wilson). Offenbach am Main, Germany: Herpeton Verlag. 400 pp. . Mendelson JR III, Kizirian DA (1995). "Geographic Variation in Rhadinaea hempsteadae (Serpentes: Colubridae) with Description of a New Species from Chiapas, Mexico". Herpetologica 51 (3): 301–313. Myers CW (2011). "A New Genus and New Tribe for Enicognathus melanauchen Jan, 1863, a Neglected South American Snake (Colubridae: Xenodontinae), with Taxonomic Notes on Some Dipsadinae". American Museum Novitates (3715): 1–33. (Rhadinella hempsteadae, new combination, p. 28). Stuart LC, Bailey JR (1941). "Three New Species of the Genus Rhadinaea from Guatemala". Occasional Papers of the Museum of Zoology, University of Michigan (442): 1–11. (Rhadinaea hempsteadae, new species, pp. 2–4).