Monodelphis pinocchio
| Monodelphis pinocchio | ||||||||||||
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Monodelphis pinocchio | ||||||||||||
| Pavan , 2015 |
Monodelphis pinocchio is a bag mammal from the genus of the shrew pouch rats ( Monodelphis ). The species occurs in the Mata Atlântica between the south of Espírito Santo and São Paulo in southeastern Brazil. It was first described in 2015 andnamedafter Pinocchio , the children's book character by the Italian author Carlo Collodi, because of its long snout.
features
The specimens examined for the first description had head-torso lengths of 8.8 to 10.3 cm, a 5.0 to 5.4 cm long tail, 11 to 13 mm long hind feet and a weight of 25 to 26 g. The species is thus a relatively small shrew- pouch rat but significantly larger than Kun's shrew- pouch rat ( M. kunsi ), its closest relative. The back of Monodelphis pinocchio is brownish to olive brown without any stripes. On the shoulders and in the middle of the back, the hair is about 5 to 6 mm long and light olive gray at the base and brownish at the tips. The belly hairs are 3 to 4 mm long and light gray to cream colored. The front and rear paws have short, black hair on top. The whiskers are dark. The longest whiskers are behind the eyes. The tail, which on average comprises about 55% of the head-trunk length, is dark brown on the upper side and lighter colored on the underside. The tail scales are arranged in spiral rows. The body color extends further back on the underside of the tail than on the top. The skull is narrow, remarkably long and flattened when viewed from the side. The snout is significantly longer than the skull.
habitat
M. pinocchio occurs in moist, mossy mountain forests and has so far been caught at heights of 790 to 2380 meters. There the species sometimes lives with the three- striped shrew pouch rat ( M. americana ), the yellow-flanked shrew pouch rat ( M. dimidiata ), Ihering's shrew rat ( M. iheringi ) and the red-headed shrew rat ( M. scalops ) in the same biotope. Like all shrew pouch rats , M. pinocchio feeds primarily on insects.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Silvia E. Pavan: A New Species of Monodelphis (Didelphimorphia: Didelphidae) from the Brazilian Atlantic Forest. American Museum Novitates Number 3832: 1-15. 2015. doi: 10.1206 / 3832.1