Antechinus flavipes subsp. flavipes, flavipes (Waterhouse)

Dyck, Steve Van, 2014, The Black-tailed Antechinus, Antechinus arktos sp. nov.: a new species of carnivorous marsupial from montane regions of the Tweed Volcano caldera, eastern Australia, Zootaxa 3765 (2), pp. 101-133 : 116

(9) A. arktos versus A. flavipes flavipes (Waterhouse)

Pelage: A. arktos has a brownish-grey head that changes markedly to an orange-brown rump, fuscous black hindfeet, a thick-based, finely-furred, black tail and an orange-yellow eye and cheek patch; A. f. flavipes has marked orange-tonings on the hands, feet and tail base and a pale eye ring.

External Measurements: A. arktos is significantly larger than A. f. flavipes in hf for males and females and in tv for males ( Table 5).

Craniodental Characters: A. arktos is smaller than A. f. flavipes in absolute measurement for SWR-LC 1 B in males and females. A. arktos is significantly smaller than A. f. flavipes for males in M 2 W, R-LC 1, R-LM 2 and M 2 W, and in females in M 2 W. A. arktos is larger than A. f. flavipes in absolute measurement for a range of craniodental characters for males and females: APV, IBW, IOW, PL, TC, NWR, PML, HT-B, I 1 -P 3, I 1 -P 3 and UPL. A. arktos is significantly larger than A. f. flavipes for a range of characters in males and females: BL, Dent, PPV, HT and UML ( Table 5).

Other Comments: A. arktos occur in south-east Qld and north-east NSW in areas of high elevation and rainfall on the Tweed Volcano caldera, whereas A. f. flavipes occurs in a wide range of drier habitat in south-east Australia. Genetics: uncorrected pairwise range differences at the mitochondrial gene Cytochrome B (CytB) between A. arktos and A. f. flavipes are 12.6–13.2%.