Barbados Threadsnake

Barbados threadsnake (Leptotyphlops carlae) is a species of blind threadsnake. It is the smallest snake species currently known to exist. This member of the Leptotyphlopidae family is endemic to the Caribbean island of Barbados.

The snake was first described and identified as a separate species in 2008 by S. Blair Hedges, a biologist from Pennsylvania State University. Hedges named the new species of snake in honor of his wife, Carla Ann Hass, a herpetologist who was part of the discovery team. Specimens of this species already existed in reference collections in the London Natural History Museum and in a museum in California, but they had been identified incorrectly, as belonging to a species now known to exist only on Martinique, another Caribbean island.

At the time of publication, August 2008, L. carlae was described as the snake species with the smallest adults in the world. The first scientific specimens taken by the research team were found under rocks in a forest. The snake is thought to be near the lower size limit for snakes imposed by natural selection, as young snakes need to attain a certain minimum size to find suitable food.