Arvicanthis Lesson 1842
Creators: name: Musser, Guy G.
name: Carleton, Michael D.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 1993
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Chordata
Mammalia
Rodentia
Muridae
Arvicanthis

description: <i>Arvicanthis</i> Lesson, 1842. Nouv. Tabi. Regn. Anim. Mammalifères, p. 147. TYPE SPECIES: <i>Lemmus niloticus</i> Desmarest, 1822. SYNONYMS: <i>Isomys.</i> COMMENTS: Opinions on the number of species in the genus have varied from one (Misonne, 1974) to several (Allen, 1939; Corbet and Hill, 1991; Dollman, 1911; Ellerman, 1941; Rousseau, 1983). The first, and in many ways still most useful, review of <i>Arvicanthis</i> was made by Dollman (1911). Several recent attempts to assess variability in the genus using breeding studies (Petter et al., 1969), morphometric analyses (Rousseau, 1983), chromosomal evidence (Capanna and Civitelli, 1988; Orlov et al., 1992; Volobouev et al., 1987; and references therein), and electrophoretic patterns of blood proteins (Kaminski et al., 1984) have provided partial insights into species-diversity within <i>Arvicanthis,</i> as have results obtained based on examination of museum specimens (focusing on qualitative traits as well as external and craniodental measurements), and study of the discussions by Dollman (1911), Hollister (1919), Osgood (1936), and Corbet and Yalden (1972). Of the five species we list, three <i>(abyssinicus, blicki,</i> and <i>somalicus)</i> are easily diagnosed and recognizable, but two <i>(niloticus</i> and <i>nairobae)</i> are not and the geographic ranges and synonyms we provide for each of them are provisional until a sound systematic revision becomes available.
description: Published as part of <i>Guy G. Musser &amp; Michael D. Carleton, 1993, Order Rodentia - Family Muridae, pp. 501-755 in Mammal Species of the World (2 nd Edition), Washington and London :Smithsonian Institution Press</i> on page 576, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.7353098
description: {"references": ["Misonne, X. 1974. Order Rodentia. Part 6. Pp. 1 - 39, in The mammals of Africa: An identification manual (J. Meester and H. W. Setzer, eds.). [issued 10 Sep 1974]. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D. C., not continuously paginated.", "Allen, G. M. 1939. A checklist of African mammals. Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard College, 83: 1 - 763.", "Corbet, G. B., and J. E. Hill. 1991. A world list of mammalian species. Third ed. British Museum (Natural History) Publications, London, 243 pp.", "Dollman, G. 1911. On Arvicanthis abyssinicus and allied East-African species, with descriptions of four new forms. Annals and Magazine of Natural History, ser. 8, 8: 334 - 353.", "Ellerman, J. R. 1941. The families and genera of living rodents. Vol. II. Family Muridae. British Museum (Natural History), London, 690 pp.", "Rousseau, M. 1983. Etude des Arvicanthis du Museum de Paris par analyses factorielles (Rongeurs, Murides). Mammalia, 47: 525 - 542.", "Petter, F., M. Quilici, Ph. Ranque, and P. Camerlynck. 1969. Croisement d'Arvicanthis niloticus (Rongeurs, Murides) du Senegal et d'Ethiopie. Mammalia, 33: 540 - 541.", "Capanna, E., and M. V. Civitelli. 1988. A cytotaxonomic approach of the systematics of Arvicanthis niloticus (Desmarest 1822) (Mammalia, Rodentia). Tropical Zoology, 1: 29 - 37.", "Volobouev, V. T., E. Viegas-Pequignot, F. Petter, and B. Dutrillaux. 1987. Karyotypic diversity and taxonomic problems in the genus Arvicanthis (Rodentia, Muridae). Genetica, 72: 147 - 150.", "Kaminski, M., M. Rousseau, and F. Petter. 1984. Electrophoretic studies on blood proteins of Arvicanthis niloticus. Biochemical Systematics and Ecology, 12: 215 - 224.", "Hollister, N. 1919. East African mammals in the United States National Museum. Part II. Rodentia, Lagomorpha, and Tubulidentata. Bulletin of the United States National Museum, 99 (2): 1 - 184.", "Osgood, W. H. 1936. New and imperfectly known small mammals from Africa. Field Museum of Natural History, Zoological Series, 20: 217 - 256.", "Corbet, G. B., and D. W. Yalden. 1972. Recent records of mammals (other than bats) from Ethiopia. Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), Zoology Series, 22 (8): 213 - 252."]}