Peromyscus eremicus Baird 1857

Wilson, Don E. & Reeder, DeeAnn, 2005, Order Rodentia - Family Cricetidae, Mammal Species of the World: a Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3 rd Edition), Volume 2, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, pp. 955-1189 : 1066

Peromyscus eremicus Baird 1857

Peromyscus eremicus Baird 1857 , Mammalia, in: Repts. U. S. Expl. Surv., Vol. 8, 1: 479.

Type Locality: USA, California, Imperial Co., Old Fort Yuma, Colorado River opposite Yuma, Arizona.

Vernacular Names: Cactus Deermouse.

Synonyms: Peromyscus alcorni Anderson 1972 ; Peromyscus anthonyi (Merriam 1887) ; Peromyscus arenarius Mearns 1896 ; Peromyscus avius Osgood 1909 ; Peromyscus cedrosensis J. A. Allen 1898 ; Peromyscus cinereus Hall 1931 ; Peromyscus collatus Burt 1932 ; Peromyscus insulicola Osgood 1909 ; Peromyscus papagensis Goldman 1917 ; Peromyscus phaeurus Osgood 1904 ; Peromyscus polypolius Osgood 1909 ; Peromyscus pullus Blossom 1933 ; Peromyscus sinaloensis Anderson 1972 ; Peromyscus tiburonensis Mearns 1897 .

Distribution: SE California, S Nevada, and SW Utah east to Trans-Pecos Texas, USA; south along mainland coast to C Sinaloa, and on the Mexican Plateau to N Zacatecas and S San Luis Potosí, México.

Conservation: IUCN – Lower Risk (lc).

Discussion: P. eremicus species group. Once included P. merriami (see Hoffmeister and Lee, 1963 a), P. eva (see Lawlor, 1971 b), and P. fraterculus (see Riddle et al., 2000 a, c). Even following removal of these several species confused under eremicus , mitochondrial DNA variation delineates well-marked W (Sonoran) and E (Chihuahuan) lineages whose taxonomic status should be explored (see Walpole et al., 1997; Riddle et al., 2000 c). Lawlor (1971 a) relegated the population on Isla Turner, collatus , to subspecies, a relationship and ranking bolstered by molecular analyses ( Hafner et al., 2001), but Hall (1981) and Alvarez-Castañeda and Cortés-Calva (1999) continued to list it as a species. Relationships of P. eremicus to various insular forms in Gulf of California elucidated first by Lawlor (1971 a, b, 1983) and later Hafner et al. (2001). Genetic variation broadly surveyed by Avise et al. (1974), Walpole et al. (1997), and Riddle et al. (2000 c). See Veal and Caire (1979, Mammalian Species, 118).