A New Species of Thomasomys (Rodentia: Muridae) from Eastern Ecuador, with Remarks on Mammalian Diversity and Biogeography in the Cordillera Oriental
Author
VOSS, ROBERT S.
text
American Museum Novitates
2003
2003-12-09
3421
1
48
http://www.bioone.org/doi/abs/10.1206/0003-0082%282003%29421%3C0001%3AANSOTR%3E2.0.CO%3B2
journal article
3793
10.1206/0003-0082(2003)421<0001:ANSOTR>2.0.CO;2
f4c2f80e-4917-4b5b-9415-0ee6377973ce
0003-0082
4734917
Sylvilagus brasiliensis
(Linnaeus)
SPECIMENS COLLECTED: None.
OTHER MATERIAL: The
type
of
Sylvilagus nivicola
is a specimen collected at
4800 m
‘‘en el límite de nieves perpetuas’’ on
Cerro Antisana
, about
10 km
south of
Papallacta
(
Cabrera, 1913: 6
).
Ten
additional specimens of rabbits from
Antisana
(
AMNH 66659– 66668
)
were subsequently collected between 4115 and
4265 m
by H.E. Anthony in 1923. Other material from Antisana (in the BMNH) was reported by
Laurie (1955)
, and a few more specimens are scattered among other museums (e.g., MCN, MNCN).
TAXONOMY: All of the material at hand is referable to
Sylvilagus brasiliensis
in the sense of
Hershkovitz (1950)
, the last comprehensive taxonomic review of South American lagomorph taxonomy.
Hershkovitz (1950)
treated
nivicola
Cabrera (1913)
as a valid subspecies of
S. brasiliensis
, but
Laurie (1955)
synonymized
nivicola
with
S. b. andinus
(
Thomas, 1897b
). The current treatment (
Hoffmann, 1993
) of 41 nominal taxa ranging from southern
Mexico
to northern
Argentina
as synonyms or subspecies of
S. brasiliensis
obviously merits critical scrutiny, but is far beyond the scope of this faunal report.
REMARKS: Although I did not collect any rabbits near Papallacta, they were abundant in grassy habitats throughout the páramo zone.