Xerobates agassiz, 1857, synonymous older than Scaptochelys Bramble, 1982 (Reptilia, Chelonii, Testudinidae) . — Recently, Bramble (1982) proposed to split the north-american testudinid genus Gopherus Rafinesque, 1832 into two genera. For the first genus, he retained the name Gopherus Rafinesque, 1832 (type-species, by original designation, Testudo polyphemus Daudin, 1801). For the second one, he created the name Scaptochelys Bramble, 1982 (type-species, by original designation, Xerobates agassizii Cooper, 1863). However he overlooked the existence of an available name for this second genus, namely Xerobates Agassiz, 1857 (type-species, by subsequent designation of Brown (1908), Xerobates berlandieri Agassiz, 1857), which must therefore replace Scaptochelys as the valid name of this genus.
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Bour et al. (1984) studied this question.