Nubian wild ass
| Nubian wild ass | ||||||||||||
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Berlin Zoo , 1899 |
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Equus asinus africanus | ||||||||||||
| ( from Heuglin & Fitzinger , 1866) |
The Nubian wild ass ( Equus asinus africanus ) is a mammal subspecies from the horse family ( Equidae ). It is a slightly smaller subspecies of the African donkey with 110 to 122 cm shoulder height. It is believed to have died out in its homeland after the last known animal was hunted in northern Sudan in 1970. However, it is possible that two populations survived outside the area of origin in Bonaire and Gebel Elba .
According to DNA studies, the Nubian donkey can be regarded as the ancestral form of a line of today's domesticated domestic donkey.
The subspecies is described as follows: shoulder height 115 to 121 cm, ears very long (182–245 mm and thus longer than Equus asinus somaliensis with 187–200 mm), body proportions shorter than this. Always with a dorsal stripe from the mane to the base of the tail, very rarely interrupted. Without leg stripes, occasionally a few dashes above the fetlock joint. Relatively short skull, diastema of small width, the constriction of the skull behind the eye sockets (postorbital) well pronounced. The eye socket is set high and interrupts the dorsal skull contour.
literature
- Roger M. Blench: A history of donkeys, wild asses and mules in Africa. In: Roger M. Blench and Kevin MacDonald (Eds.): The origins and development of African livestock. Archeology, genetics, linguistics and ethnography. UCL Press, London 2000, pp. 339-354 ( PDF; 298 kB ).
- Heuglin Th. V & Fitzinger LJ (1866). "Systematic overview of the mammals of northeast Africa including the Arabian coast, the Red Sea, the Somáli and the Nile spring countries, south to the fourth degree north latitude. By Dr Theodor v. Heuglin. According to correspondence and the original copies of the author supplemented and provided with additions by the w. M. Dr Leopold Joseph Fitzinger ". Session reports of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, Dept. 1. Mathematical and Natural Science Class 54: 537–611.
Individual evidence
- ^ Colin Groves & Peter Grubb: Ungulate Taxonomy. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore 2011, ISBN 978-1-4214-0093-8 , at 14.