Published December 31, 2005 | Version v1
Taxonomic treatment Open

Dipodillus (Dipodillus) simoni Lataste 1881

Description

Dipodillus (Dipodillus) simoni Lataste 1881

Dipodillus (Dipodillus) simoni Lataste 1881, Le Naturaliste (Paris), 3: 499.

Type Locality: Algeria, Oued Magra.

Vernacular Names: Simon's Dipodil.

Synonyms: Dipodillus (Dipodillus) kaiseri (Setzer 1958).

Distribution: Along the coast of Egypt (west of Nile Delta) and NE Libya, coastal and inland in NW Libya and Tunisia, and high plateau region of the Atlas in Algeria and E Morocco (see Cockrum et al., 1976).

Conservation: IUCN – Lower Risk (lc) as Gerbillus simoni.

Discussion: Subgenus Dipodillus. A distinctive species (Lay, 1983; Pavlinov et al., 1990) revised by Cockrum et al. (1976 a) and reviewed by Pavlinov et al. (1990). Regional reviews are available for Egypt (Osborn and Helmy, 1980), Libya (Ranck, 1968), and Algeria (Kowalski and Rzebik-Kowalska, 1991). Although samples from coastal Egypt (kaiseri) have, on average, slightly longer tails, darker pelage, and smaller auditory bulla than do those from the western portion of the range (simoni), the variation is clinal east to west, prompting Cockrum et al. (1976 a) to treat all populations as a single species. This interpretation was endorsed by Osborn and Helmy (1980) from their study of Egyptian samples and comparisons with data in the literature, and supports Wassif’s (1956, 1960) earlier conclusion that kaiseri is synonymous with D. simoni. Chromosomal data summarized by Qumsiyeh and Schlitter (1991); karyotype (2n = 60, FN = 72) of Tunisian sample described by Chetoui et al. (2002).

Notes

Published as part of Wilson, Don E. & Reeder, DeeAnn, 2005, Order Rodentia - Family Muridae, pp. 1189-1531 in Mammal Species of the World: a Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3 rd Edition), Volume 2, Baltimore :The Johns Hopkins University Press on page 1216, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.7316535

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Linked records

Additional details

Biodiversity

Scientific name authorship
Lataste
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
Chordata
Order
Rodentia
Family
Muridae
Genus
Dipodillus
Species
simoni
Taxon rank
species
Taxonomic concept label
Dipodillus (Dipodillus) simoni Lataste, 1881 sec. Wilson & Reeder, 2005

References

  • Lay, D. M. 1983. Taxonomy of the genus Gerbillus (Rodentia: Gerbillinae) with comments on the applications of generic and subgeneric names and an annotated list of species. Zeitschrift fur Saugetierkunde, 48: 329 - 354.
  • Pavlinov, I. Ya., Yu. A. Dubrovsky, O. L. Rossolimo, and E. G. Potapova. 1990. [Gerbils of the world.] Nauka, Moscow, 368 pp. (in Russian).
  • Cockrum, E. L., T. C. Vaughan, and P. J. Vaughan. 1976 a. A review of North African short-tailed gerbils (Dipodillus) with description of a new taxon from Tunisia. Mammalia, 40 (2): 313 - 326.
  • Osborn, D. J., and I. Helmy. 1980. The contemporary land mammals of Egypt (including Sinai). Fieldiana: Zoology, 5: 1 - 579.
  • Ranck, G. L. 1968. The rodents of Libya: Taxonomy, ecology, and zoogeographical relationships. Bulletin of the United States National Museum, 275: 1 - 264.
  • Kowalski, K., and B. Rzebik-Kowalska. 1991. Mammals of Algeria. Zaklad Narodowy Imienia Ossolinskich Wydawnictwo Polskiej Akademii Nauk Wroclaw, Poland, 370 pp.
  • Qumsiyeh, M. B., and D. A. Schlitter. 1991. Cytogenetic data on the rodent family Gerbillidae. Occasional Papers, The Museum, Texas Tech University, 144: 1 - 20.
  • Chetoui, M., K. Said, M. Rezig, and T. L. Cheniti. 2002. Analyse caryologique de quatre especes de gerbilles (Rongeurs, Gerbillinae) de Tunisie. Bulletin de la Societe zoologique de France, 127 (3): 211 - 221.