Xeronycteris vieirai Gregorin & Ditchfield, 2005

Gutierrez, Eliecer E. & Marinho-Filho, Jader, 2017, The mammalian faunas endemic to the Cerrado and the Caatinga, ZooKeys 644, pp. 105-157 : 111

Xeronycteris vieirai Gregorin & Ditchfield, 2005

Distribution.

Xeronycteris vieirai is endemic to the Caatinga, and has been recorded in the Brazilian states of Bahia, Minas Gerais, Paraíba, and Pernambuco ( Gregorin and Ditchfield 2005, Nogueira et al. 2007, 2014a, 2015, Astúa and Guerra 2008).

Conservation status.

The red list of the IUCN ver. 3.1 assigned the category "Data Deficient" to Xeronycteris vieirai (see Solari 2015). The species appears in the official list of threatened species of Brazil with the category “Vulnerable” ( ICMBIO-MMA 2016). Eleven years after its description ( Gregorin and Ditchfield 2005), Xeronycteris vieirai is known from only eight specimens and seven localities from the Caatinga ( Gregorin and Ditchfield 2005, Nogueira et al. 2007, 2014a, 2015, Astúa and Guerra 2008), a biome with large disturbed areas as well as areas undergoing desertification ( Albuquerque et al. 2012). Considering habitat loss, the specialized diet and the endemic nature of Xeronycteris vieirai , Gregorin and Ditchfield (2005) noted that the species might be one of most threatened species of mammals in Brazil. We agree with this view, and strongly encourage NGOs and governmental agencies in charge of producing influential "red lists of threatened species" to revaluate the conservation status they have assigned to Xeronycteris vieirai ; a realistic category for the species should reflect at the very least a moderate risk of extinction, particularly considering trends of habitat loss in the Caatinga ( Albuquerque et al. 2012).