116.

Rupicolous Gerbil

Gerbillus rupicola

French: Gerbille rupicole / German: Felsenrennmaus / Spanish: Gerbillo rupicola

Other common names: Rock Gerbil, Rupicolous Dipodil

Taxonomy. Gerbillus rupicola Granjon et al., 2002,

Emnal’here, Mali.

Recently created on morphological and chromosomal grounds, G. rupicola was moved to genus Dipodillus by G. G. Musser and M. D. Carleton in 2005. Molecular study, however, showed that Dipodillus is better treated as synonym of Gerbillus . A.

Ndiaye and colleagues in 2014 sequenced one individual from type locality and found its closest relative to be G. campestris . Monotypic.

Distribution. Known only from two localities in S Mali, S of Niger River.

Descriptive notes. Head-body 95-106 mm,tail 136-142 mm, ear 14-5-16-5 mm, hindfoot 26-28 mm; weight 31-39 g. A small to medium-sized gerbil, Rupicolous Gerbil has tawny-rufous dorsal pelage and white venter. It is very similar to the North African Gerbil ( G. campestris) in morphology. Feet are white and soles of hindfeet naked. Very long tail (140% of head-body length) ends in pencil of dark hairs. Chromosomal complement has 2n = 52, FNa = 68.

Habitat. Rocky areas in Sahelian savanna zone (inselbergs, cliffs, fallen rocks).

Food and Feeding. No information.

Breeding. No information.

Activity patterns. Rupicolous Gerbil is probably nocturnal, and terrestrial.

Movements, Home range and Social organization. No information.

Status and Conservation. Classified as Least Concern on The IUCN Red List.

Bibliography. Granjon & Duplantier (2009), Granjon, Aniskin et al. (2002), Happold (2013a), Monadjem et al. (2015), Musser & Carleton (2005), Ndiaye et al. (2014).