Muli pika
Ochotona muliensis is a mammal of the family of pikas among lagomorphs. Its distribution area is limited to an area in the province of Sichuan in China.
Features
Ochotona muliensis is a great pika with a body length of 22 centimeters. He turns slightly rusty red, the back of the ears is chestnut brown to yellow -orange. From Ochotona gloveri, as its subspecies it was originally described, it differs only by a few features of the skull, especially the lack of windowing in the frontal bone.
Dissemination
Ochotona muliensis is endemic in the People's Republic of China. The species is known only from an area in the western part of Sichuan province. There she lives at altitudes up to 3600 meters.
Way of life
Over the life of this pikas has no information. He probably lives like other pikas of China and feeds generalist plants. As habitat it uses thickets and steppes, while the closely related O. settled gloveri gravel plains.
System
Ochotona muliensis was assigned as an independent species the pikas ( genus Ochotona ) and the subgenus Conothoa, subspecies are not known.
The first scientific description was made by Pen & Feng in 1962, which considered as a subspecies of Ochotona muliensis Ochotona gloveri. In 1985, he was, however, by Feng and Zheng and in 2001 by Niu et al. regarded as a distinct species because it differs from O. gloveri by several skull characteristics and by a different habitat.
Threats and conservation
A risk assessment by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources ( IUCN) does not take place due to the limited data available, the species is classified according to the group " data deficient ". There are only a few museum specimens of the species in the wild and no animals were observed for 40 years.