Big-eared pika
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Big-eared pika ( Ochotona macrotis ) |
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The big-eared pipe hare ( Ochotona macrotis ) is a kind of the pipe hare (Ochotonidae) within the hare-like (Lagomorpha). It occurs in the Himalayas and in the Tian Shan ; its distribution area extends from southern Kazakhstan through parts of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the People's Republic of China and northern India .
With a height of 15 to 21 centimeters and a weight of up to 280 grams, it belongs to the medium-sized species of the pika. It differs from other species of the genus primarily in its very large ears and specific coloration, with melanistic and thus completely black animals also occurring.
The first scientific description comes from Albert Günther from 1875; the taxonomic classification of the pigeon hares is difficult and has changed several times over time, which can be attributed to the great similarity of the individual species and subspecies to one another. Due to the comparatively large distribution area and the lack of risks that endanger the survival of the species, the species is not considered endangered.
features
general characteristics
The big-eared pika is a medium-sized pika with a body length of 15 to 21 centimeters and a weight of 160 to 280 grams. In summer it has a pale brown to sand-gray fur with an ocher tint, in winter the fur is longer and soft with a pale gray color and smoky-yellow areas. In the subspecies O. m. macrotis appear on the shoulders and the head, smoky yellow and brown spots, O. m. wollastoni , on the other hand, has no stains. The forehead is reddish-brown in color. The ventral side is white to gray-white. In addition to the normally colored animals, there are also animals that are melanistic and thus colored black.
The eponymous ears reach a length of 23 to 36 millimeters and are therefore very large compared to those of other pigeon bunnies, they are rounded and have a black border. Compared to those of the closest related Royle pigeon hare ( Ochotona roylei ), they are somewhat wider and have long hair on the inside. The hind feet are 28 to 37 millimeters long, the feet are white with bare pads.
The genome consists of 2n = 62 chromosomes .
Features of the skull
The skull is medium-sized for a pika and corresponds in shape and size to that of the Royle pika. The total length of the skull is 38 to 44 millimeters, the width 21 to 23 millimeters and the height 15 to 18 millimeters. The incisor window located in the bony palate and the palatal window behind it merge into a single larger opening in this species. The frontal bone often also has a pair of smaller windows, but this characteristic is not generally true. The bullae of the ear are formed of medium size.
| 2 | · | 0 | · | 3 | · | 2 | = 26 |
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Like all pigeons, the animals have two incisors on both sides in the upper jaw, followed by a longer gap ( diastema ) as well as three front teeth (premolars) and two back teeth (molares). In the branch of the lower jaw, there are only one incisor and only two premolars on both sides, but three molars. The animals have a total of 26 teeth.
distribution
The big-eared pika is distributed over a comparatively large area in Central Asia in the mountain ranges of the Himalayas , the Pamir , the Hindu Kush and the Tian Shan . The distribution area extends from southeastern Kazakhstan as well as from eastern Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan via northeastern Pakistan and Afghanistan , northern India , Nepal and Bhutan to the mountainous regions of the provinces of Xizang , Sichuan , Xinjiang , Yunnan , Qinghai and Gansu in the People's Republic of China . Some subspecies are also found in northern India.
The height distribution of the animals ranges from 2300 to 6126 meters, whereby the species prefers higher altitudes when common with Ochotona roylei . According to other sources, they are mainly found at altitudes of 3000 to 5700 meters, the subspecies O. m. sacana colonizes the lowest lying areas at altitudes of 2500 to 4000 meters in the Chinese Tian Shan.
Way of life
The big-eared pika lives in rocky mountain regions and pine forests. The animals use crevices and hollows under and between stones as structures and are largely diurnal, sometimes they are also active at dusk and at night. The animals move quickly, running and jumping. As a rule, they come out of their burrows in the morning before sunrise and eat until mid-morning, then they retreat mainly due to the rising temperatures; the evening activity begins with falling temperatures and continues until after sunset. In search of food, the animals move mainly in the upper areas of stone piles, but sometimes also walk openly and uncovered on the rocky surfaces and on the vegetation. The animals do not live very socially in family groups with territories that are usually occupied by a pair of parents and their young. Big-eared potters show no aggressive territorial behavior and do not form fixed and exclusive territories . The activity areas overlap accordingly and take up an area of a maximum of 1600 m² per individual. The population density varies between 500 individuals per km² in the high areas and 2300 individuals per km² in the valleys with more pronounced vegetation. The vocalizations of the animals are quiet and rare and their social and communicative significance within the groups is accordingly questioned.
They generally feed on parts of plants such as grasses, leaves, twigs as well as mosses and lichens, although unlike many other types of pigeon bunnies they do not create bales of dried grass (hay bales) and store them as a reserve. During the warmer seasons, the animals feed mainly on green parts of plants, berries and fruits, and in the drier and colder seasons they eat dry twigs, grasses and other parts of plants. Like other pigeon hares, the big-eared pika also lay “latrines” under stones and bushes in which they leave their excrement pills.
Compared to other species, the reproductive rate of the big-eared pika is low and dependent on regional conditions. For the litters, the females create brood chambers between the stones, which are padded with feathers and fur. The females have a gestation period of about 30 days and often give birth to two from April to mid-August, and in the case of O. m. sacana up to three litters per year with an average of two to seven young animals each. The young are born with a thick coat, the eyes are still closed. The animals reach sexual maturity after about seven to ten months. They reach an age of up to three years, after just one year they are producing their own offspring.
Systematics
The big-eared Pfeifhase is assigned as a separate species to the Pfeifhasen (genus Ochotona ) and the subgenus Conothoa . The first scientific description comes from the year 1875 by Albert CLG Günther , the then head of the zoological department at the Natural History Museum in London, who called the species Lagomys macrotis and together with it several other species of the hare-like such as the Ladakh pigeon hares ( Ochotona ladacensis ), the Yarkand hare ( Lepus yarkandensis ) and the Lepus pamirensis , which is now classified as a subspecies of the desert hare ( Lepus tibetanus ) .
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Phylogenetic systematics of some Pfeifehasen according to Yu et al. 2000
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Phylogenetic systematics of some pigeons according to Niu et al. 2004
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As with most pika, the systematic classification of the big-eared pika is difficult due to the great similarities of the species and has changed several times over time. At times, the species was added to the Royle-Pfeifhasen ( O. roylei ) as a subspecies, but due to morphological and ecological differences in the regions in which both species occur sympatric , the species status of Ochotona macrotis was confirmed.
In 2000, on the basis of sequences of the mitochondrial DNA, the Royle pigeon was identified as a sister species of the big-eared pika, according to these results, both together form the sister group to a taxon from the Ladakh piper ( Ochotona ladacensis ) and the Koslow piper ( O. Koslowi ). Together with the Forrest-Pfeifhasen ( Ochotona forresti ) and the Red-eared Pfeifhasen ( Ochotona erythrotis ), all these species were grouped together as a "mountain group", while the classic sub-genus division was rejected as paraphyletic . In 2004 a phylogenetic analysis on the basis of the sequence of cytochrome b was published , in which the sister group ratio of the big-eared and Royle piper was confirmed, but the Ladakh piper is the basal sister species of a taxon from O. koslowi , O. rutila , O. iliensis , O. roylei and O. macrotis ; the entire group plus a few other species was classified in a "Surrounding Qinghai-Tibet Plateau Group". After Andrei Alexandrowitsch Lissowski revised the taxonomy in 2013 on the basis of craniometric features and the sequence of cytochrome b, some details of the phylogenetic classification were changed, but the close relationship between the species was confirmed. Lissowski put these species together in the subgenus Conothoa .
In total, five subspecies are described together with the nominate form :
- O. m. macrotis Günther , 1875: nominate form; The subspecies occurs in the Kunlun Mountains in the highlands of Tibet , in Xinjiang and the neighboring Qinghai .
- O. m. chinensis Thomas , 1911: The subspecies lives in northwestern Hengduan Shan in southeastern Tibet , in western Sichuan and northern Yunnan in southern China.
- O. m. sacana Thomas , 1914: The subspecies is in the Tian Shan , the Pamir and Alay Mountains in front of the southwest Kazakhstan to Tajikistan.
- O. m. wollastoni Thomas & Hinton , 1922: This subspecies lives in the Karakoram Mountains and in the Ladakh region. The subspecies was named after Alexander FR Wollaston , who as a scientist accompanied the expedition of the Royal Geographical Society to Mount Everest and who made the type specimens collected on the expedition available to the zoologists Thomas and Hinton who worked at the British Museum . They described the animals as Ochotona wollastoni and thus as an independent species, which they classified in the closer relationship of the Royle-Pfeifhasen ( O. roylei ).
- O. m. gomchee Lissovsky , McDonough , Dahal , Jin , Liu & Ruedas , 2017: This subspecies was only described in 2017 by an international research team led by Andrei Alexandrowitsch Lissowski . It occurs in Bhutan in the Chamka Chhu area and probably as far as the eastern Himalayas in the Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh regions .
Ochotona auritus Blanford , 1875, was classified by Wilson & Reeder in 2005 as a further subspecies of the big-eared pika and is now considered a synonym of the Ladakh piper ( Ochotona ladacensis ). The assignment of Ochotona forresti duoxionglaensis Chen Xiaocheng & Li Wenjing , 2009, from Motuo and Mainling in the Namcha Barwa Himal in the loop of Brahmaputra in the southeast of the Tibet Autonomous Region to the big-eared whistle is discussed on the basis of craniological data analyzes.
Hazard and protection
The species is classified as not endangered (least concern) by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) due to its large distribution area. Although exact data on the current population size are not available, it is assumed that it is a regularly occurring species and that there are no major fluctuations in population sizes. Interaction with people rarely occurs due to the high and remote habitats of the animals; in rare cases the animals use walls or buildings on the edge of their range as shelter.
In the Indian part of the range, the species occurs in the Hemis National Park and in the Kanji Wildlife Sanctuary , and it could also occur in the Changthang Wildlife Sanctuary . In China, the big-eared pika occurs in the Tuomuerfeng, Zhumulangmafeng, Changtang and Sanjiangyuan nature reserves.
supporting documents
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p A.A. Lissovsky: Large-eared Pika - Ochotona macrotis. In: Don E. Wilson, TE Lacher, Jr., Russell A. Mittermeier (eds.): Handbook of the Mammals of the World: Lagomorphs and Rodents 1. (HMW, Volume 6), Lynx Edicions, Barcelona 2016; P. 57. ISBN 978-84-941892-3-4 .
- ↑ a b c d e Large-Eared Pika. In: Andrew T. Smith , Yan Xie: A Guide to the Mammals of China. Princeton University Press, 2008; Pp. 283-284. ISBN 978-0-691-09984-2 .
- ↑ a b Joseph A. Chapman, John EC Flux (Ed.): Rabbits, Hares and Pikas. Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan. (PDF; 11.3 MB) International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), Gland 1990; Pp. 39-40. ISBN 2-8317-0019-1 .
- ↑ Family Ochotonidae, Genu Ochotona. In: Andrew T. Smith , Yan Xie: A Guide to the Mammals of China. Princeton University Press, 2008; P. 275. ISBN 978-0-691-09984-2 .
- ↑ a b c d e f g Ochotona macrotis in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2017.3. Posted by: Andrew T. Smith , A. Lissovsky, 2016. Retrieved July 1, 2018.
- ↑ a b c d e A.A. Lissovsky, Molly McDonough, Nishma Dahal, Wei Jin, Shaoying Liu, Luis A. Ruedas: A new subspecies of large-eared pika, Ochotona macrotis (Lagomorpha: Ochotonidae), from the Eastern Himalaya. Russian Journal of Theriology 16 (1), 2017; Pp. 30-42. ( Full text ).
- ^ A b Oldfield Thomas , Martin Alister Campbell Hinton : The mammals of the 1921 Mount Everest expedition. The Annals and magazine of natural history; zoology, botany, and geology 9, series 9; Pp. 178–186, first description on pp. 184–186. ( Digitized version )
- ↑ Takeo Kawamichi: Daily activities and social pattern of two Himalayan pikas, Ochotona macrotis and O. rolei, observed at Mt. Everest. Journal of the Faculty of Science, Hokkaido University Series VI, Zoology 17, 1971, pp. 587-609 ( [1] ).
- ^ A b c Don E. Wilson & DeeAnn M. Reeder (eds.): Ochotona (Conothoa) macrotis in Mammal Species of the World. A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3rd ed).
- ^ A b Albert Günther : Descriptions of some Leporine Mammals from Central Asia. The Annals and magazine of natural history; zoology, botany, and geology ser. 4, 16, 1875; P. 231 ff. ( Digitized version )
- ↑ a b Ning Yu, Changlin Zheng, Ya-Ping Zhang, Wen-Hsiung Li: Molecular Systematics of Pikas (Genus Ochotona) Inferred from Mitochondrial DNA Sequences. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 16 (1) July 2000; Pp. 85-95. doi : 10.1006 / mpev.2000.0776 .
- ↑ a b Yidong Niu, Fuwen Wei, Ming Li, Xiaoming Liu, Zuojian Feng: Phylogeny of pikas (Lagomorpha, Ochotona) inferred from mitochondrial cytochrome b sequences. Folia Zoologica - International Journal of Vertebrate Zoology 53 (2), 2004; Pp. 141-155. ( Full text ).
- ^ Andrey A. Lissovsky: Taxonomic revision of pikas Ochotona (Lagomorpha, Mammalia) at the species level. In: Mammalia 2014; 78 (2): 199-216. doi : 10.1515 / mammalia-2012-0134
- ^ AA Lissovsky: Ladak Pika - Ochotona ladacensis. In: Don E. Wilson, TE Lacher, Jr., Russell A. Mittermeier (eds.): Handbook of the Mammals of the World: Lagomorphs and Rodents 1. (HMW, Volume 6), Lynx Edicions, Barcelona 2016; Pp. 58-59. ISBN 978-84-941892-3-4 .
- ↑ Chen Xiaocheng, Li Wenjing: A new subspecies of Ochotona forresti in southeastern Tibet, China. ACTA Theriologica Sinica 29 (1), 2009; Pp. 101-105. ( Abstract )
- ↑ Dana Jordan: Ochotona macrotis, large-eared pika. Animal Diversity Net, 2005; Retrieved July 9, 2018.
literature
- AA Lissovsky: Large-eared Pika - Ochotona macrotis. In: Don E. Wilson, TE Lacher, Jr., Russell A. Mittermeier (eds.): Handbook of the Mammals of the World: Lagomorphs and Rodents 1. (HMW, Volume 6), Lynx Edicions, Barcelona 2016; P. 57. ISBN 978-84-941892-3-4 .
- Joseph A. Chapman, John EC Flux (Eds.): Rabbits, Hares and Pikas. Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan. (PDF; 11.3 MB) International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), Gland 1990; Pp. 39-40. ISBN 2-8317-0019-1 .
- Large-Eared Pika. In: Andrew T. Smith , Yan Xie: A Guide to the Mammals of China. Princeton University Press, 2008; Pp. 283-284. ISBN 978-0-691-09984-2 .
Web links
- Ochotona macrotis inthe IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2017.3. Posted by: Andrew T. Smith , A. Lissovsky, 2016. Retrieved July 1, 2018.
- Dana Jordan: Ochotona macrotis, large-eared pika. Animal Diversity Net, 2005
