Mustela vison Schreber, 1777

W. Christopher Wozencraft, 1993, Order Carnivora, Mammal Species of the World (2 nd Edition), Washington and London: Smithsonian Institution Press, pp. 279-348 : 324

Mustela vison Schreber, 1777 . Die Säugethiere, 3(19):pl. 127,B[1777); text, 3(26):463[1777].

TYPE LOCALITY: "Man findet das Vison in Canada un Pensilvanien" .

DISTRIBUTION: North America from Alaska and Canada through all of USA except SW deserts. Introduced to Iceland, NC Europe, British Isis, Norway, Belarussia, Baltic States, Spain, and Siberia.

SYNONYMS: antiquus Loomis, 1911; borealis Brass, 1911 ; energumenos Bangs, 1896; evagor Hall, 1932; evergladensis Hamilton, 1948; ingens Osgood, 1900; lacustris Preble, 1902 ; letifera Hollister, 1915; lowii Anderson, 1945; lutensis Bangs, 1898 ; lutreocephala Harlan, 1825 ; macrodon Prentiss, 1903 ; melampeplus Elliot, 1903; mink Peale and Palisot de Beauvois, 1796 ; minx Turton, 1800; nesolestes Heller, 1909; nigrescens Audubon and Bachman, 1854 ; rufa Smith, 1858 ; vulgivagus Bangs, 1895 ; winingus Baird, 1857 .

COMMENTS: Manville (1966) demonstrated that macrodon is conspecific, although Kurtén and Anderson (1980) recognized it as a distinct species. Hall (1951), Heptner and Yurgenson (1967), and Hollister (1913a) considered vison closely related to lutreola , however analyses by Graphodatskii et al. (1976) and Youngman (1982) supported vison to be one of the earliest offshoots of the Mustela lineage. Youngman (1982) placed vison in the subgenus Vison.