568.

Blyth’s Mouse

Mus nitidulus

French: Souris de Blyth / German: Blyth-Maus / Spanish: Raton de Blyth

Other common names: Little Myanmar Field Mouse

Taxonomy. Mus nitidulus Blyth, 1859,

valley of Sitang River, Tenasserim Province, Burma (= Myanmar).

Previously included within the synonymy of M. cervicolor . Its rediscovery allowed T. Shimada and colleagues, in 2007, to resurrect the species and publish its molecular and morphological differences from M. cervicolor . These authors found it to share close affinities with M. booduga, within a “ M. booduga clade” in the subgenus Mus . Its sister taxon is M. booduga, an association that was not apparently considered by J. T. Marshall in his 1977 revision. Monotypic.

Distribution. Endemic to C Myanmar.

Descriptive notes. Head—body 53-91 mm, tail 52-73 mm, ear 10-13 mm, hindfoot 15-19-5 mm; weight 16-18 g. In the original description, Blyth’s Mouse is described as similar to the House Mouse ( M. musculus), with the same dorsal coloration, white belly, and large ears. It is a medium-sized mouse with the tail shorter than the head-body length. Dorsal pelage is very soft with fine translucent and flexible spines;it is pale grayish-brown. Tail varies from strongly to weakly bicolored. Females bear five pairs of mammae.

Habitat. Blyth’s Mouse occurs in a mosaic of very degraded evergreen and deciduous monsoon forests, mixed with rice fields.

Food and Feeding. No information.

Breeding. No information.

Activity patterns. No information.

Movements, Home range and Social organization. Burrows consist of several entrances into an extensive network of galleries linking multiple breeding chambers, each lined with rice straw. These systems occupy at least a 4-5 m length. Multiple nests are present, suggesting these large systems may be occupied over many seasons by numerous individuals.

Status and Conservation. Not assessed on The IUCN Red List. Blyth’s Mouse may be abundant in rice fields.

Bibliography. Marshall (1977a), Shimada, Aplin, Jenkins & Suzuki (2007), Shimada, Aplin & Suzuki (2010).