Hopping mouse

Reddish-brown Australian Hüpfmaus ( Notomys cervinus ) Gould

The Australian Hüpfmäuse ( Notomys ) are a domiciled inside Australia rodent genus from the group of Altweltmäuse ( Murinae ). The genus includes five living and at least as many extinct species.

Features

The Australian Hüpfmäuse have similarities with the jumping mice and pocket mice, with which they are but only very distantly related. They reach a body length from 9 to 18 inches, added a 13 to 23 centimeters long tail. My weight varies between 20 and 50 grams. The hind feet are greatly enlarged and are used to bouncing locomotion. Their fur is colored beige to gray- brown on the top, the underside is white or light gray. The long tail has a brush-like tip. The ears are very large, the incisors very strong. In all species, the females have four teats.

Way of life

Habitat of Hüpfmäuse are sand dunes, grass and heath lands. They are nocturnal and dig their own burrows to rest. Their diet consists mainly of berries, leaves, seeds and other plant material. At least two species live in groups with distinct social behavior, the females suckle for example, the other newborns. After an approximately 32 - to 43- day gestation, the female gives birth to two to four, sometimes up to nine pups.

System

Currently, ten species are known:

• The Australian Hüpfmaus ( Notomys alexis ) lives in Western Australia, Northern Territory, South Australia and Western Queensland, it thus has the largest distribution area of all Australian Hüpfmäuse. Of the Aborigines it is tarrkawarra called.
• The short-tailed Hüpfmaus ( Notomys amplus ) is extinct. Subfossil remains of this kind were found in the southern Northern Territory and northern South Australia, presumably it was once common in parts of western and central Australia.
• The Northern Hüpfmaus ( Notomys Aquilo ) is known only from the coastal region of northern Arnhem Land and Groote Eylandt from the island, the stocks in Queensland are extinguished. The IUCN lists them as " critically endangered ".
• The Reddish-brown Australian Hüpfmaus ( Notomys cervinus ) is widespread in north-eastern South Australia and southwestern Queensland. According to IUCN is the kind of " at risk ".
• Notomys fuscus inhabits a small area in the interior of Australia and is also "at risk".
• The long-tailed Hüpfmaus ( Notomys longicaudatus ) is extinct, since 1901 or 1902 no specimen was sighted. The species inhabited earlier large parts of the dry interior of Australia.
• The Großohrhüpfmaus ( Notomys macrotis ) is known and extinct only two copies. The only locality was at Moore River in Western Australia; probably was the type closely related to the fawn Australian Hüpfmaus.
• Mitchells Hüpfmaus ( Notomys mitchellii ) is the largest living species of Australian Hüpfmäuse. She lives in southern Western Australia, southern South Australia and western Victoria. The species is " not at risk ".
• The Darling Downs Hüpfmaus ( Notomys mordax ) is known only from a skull Fund, which was made in the 1840s in the Darling Downs in south-eastern Queensland. This species is considered extinct.
• The broad cheeks - Hüpfmaus ( Notomys robustus ) was first described scientifically in 2008. It is only by incomplete remains of the Flinders Ranges in South Australia and from the Davenport Range National Park is known and there probably extinct 1850-1900.

According to Musser & Carleton (2005), the currently known species do not reflect the actual diversity of this genus, they keep systematic studies of subfossil remains and DNA tests necessary. So subfossiles material of another extinct species dating from 1850 is known, has been described to date.

Systematically, the Australian Hüpfmäuse part of Pseudomys group, a predominantly Australian Radiation of Altweltmäuse.