The Black-tailed Antechinus, Antechinus arktos sp. nov.: a new species of carnivorous marsupial from montane regions of the Tweed Volcano caldera, eastern Australia
Author
Dyck, Steve Van
Queensland Museum, Vertebrate Zoology (Mammals & Birds), PO Box 3300, South Brisbane, Qld, 4101, Australia
text
Zootaxa
2014
2014-02-17
3765
2
101
133
journal article
5910
10.11646/zootaxa.3765.2.1
300ad198-2377-4bfd-9381-6868ee9c5f7a
1175-5326
5045725
E7DDABDA-5DA6-4309-A26F-121FCB030EEE
Antechinus arktos
,
sp. nov.
(Black-tailed
Antechinus
)
Etymology.
The species epithet refers to the bear-like appearance of the
holotype
(
arktos
is Greek for bear): very long guard hairs cover the body and the animal has a tendency to rear on its hind legs sniffing the air when disturbed, rather than the typical acrobatic leaping behaviour of most congeners. The common name refers to the evenly black-coloured tail of the species, especially when compared to the dark brownish tail of
A. swainsonii
.
FIGURE 4.
(a–b) Photograph of live
A. arktos
paratype specimen; (c) underside hindfoot of the holotype specimen; note the dark pigmentation around the granules. Photographs (a–b) are Copyright Gary Cranitch (Qld Museum); photograph (c) is Copyright Harry Hines.
Material.
HOLOTYPE
:
QM
JM 20009
(field number N86204), adult female, complete skull and dentary extracted.
Body
is deep frozen (destined for long-term storage as a puppet skin). DNA sample (liver) is stored in 95% ethanol and frozen.
The
specimen was collected on
28 May 2013
by
A.M.Baker
,
T
.
Y. Mutton
,
H.B. Hines
and J.
Rowland in an Elliott trap
baited with peanut butter, oats and bacon.
FIGURE 5.
A. arktos
holotype specimen photographs of skull and dentary (a–f): a. skull, top view; b. skull, bottom view; c. skull, side view; d. dentary, top view; e. dentary, bottom view; f. dentary, side view. Photographs are Copyright Andrew Baker.
PARATYPE
: The
paratype
specimen,
QM
JM20010
, was collected
28 May 2013
by
A.M.Baker
,
T
.
Y. Mutton
,
H. Hines
and
J. Rowland
from Bilbrough Lookout,
Springbrook National Park
,
SEQ
28° 14´03˝ S
153° 17´23˝ E
. This specimen was photographed live by Qld Museum photographer Gary Cranitch prior to accession into the Qld Museum collection (see
Figure 4
).
Figure 5
shows features of the skull, dentary and teeth of the
holotype
specimen
.
REFERRED SPECIMENS: (
JM
prefixes are from the
Queensland
Museum
; M prefixes are from the
Australian Museum
).
These
specimens were formalin-fixed and old so genetics was not possible.
For
the following adults skull morphology was used to confirm species identification as
A. arktos
:
males
JM834
O’Reilly’s Guest House
,
SEQ
28° 13´S
153° 07´E
;
JM835
Binna Burra Lodge
,
SEQ
28° 12´S
153° 11´E
;
JM836
Dave’s Creek Country Binna Burra
,
SEQ
28° 13´S
153° 13´E
;
JM2281
O’Reilly’s Guest House
,
SEQ
28° 14´S
153° 08´E
(all preceding localities are within or immediately adjacent to
Lamington
NP
)
;
M20605
Eastern Border Ranges
NP
,
NENSW
28° 23´S
153° 04´E
,
females
:
JM1595
Warrie
NP
(now within
Springbrook
NP
)
,
SEQ
28° 13´S
153° 16´E
;
JM7949
Eastern Border Ranges
NP
,
NENSW
28° 25´S
153° 07´E
.
In
addition
two juvenile
specimens are assigned to
A. arktos
on the basis of external morphology:
JM1594
National Park
752 (now within
Springbrook
NP
)
28° 14´S
153° 16´E
,
SEQ
and M20606
Eastern Border Ranges
,
NENSW
28° 22´S
153° 06´E
.
Holotype
locality.
A small gully near
Best of All Lookout
,
Mount Mumdjin
,
Springbrook National Park
, south-east
Queensland
,
Australia
(
28° 14´29.6˝ S
153° 15´50.6˝ E
. Datum: GDA 94),
950m
altitude.
Distribution.
All specimens are from upland, high rainfall vegetation communities of the Tweed Shield Volcano caldera in south-east
Queensland
and north-east
New South Wales
. The species is currently only known from Springbrook NP, Lamington NP and Border Ranges NP (eastern section only). The following museum specimens from north-east
New South Wales
were registered as
A. swainsonii
but on re-examination by us were clearly not
A. arktos
or
A. swainsonii
: Australian Museum M31942 Grafton (reidentified as
A. flavipes
); Australian Museum
M29214
Conglomerate State Forest (reidentified as
A. stuartii
); Australian Museum M12631 Coffs Harbour (reidentified as
A. stuartii
); Australian National Wildlife Collection M24077 Tooloom (reidentified as
A. stuartii
). There are published (e.g.,
Dickman, 1982
) and unpublished records (e.g., Atlas of Living
Australia
, Atlas of NSW Wildlife) of
A. swainsonii
sensu lato
between Ebor (
type
locality for
A. s. mimetes
) and the uplands of the Tweed caldera. However, without specimens and/or genetic samples we are unable to comment further on the identity of these records. Workers in this region are encouraged to retain voucher and tissue specimens to enable a better understanding of the distribution of
A. arktos
and
A. s. mimetes
.
Diagnosis.
Summary of external differences amongst congeners.
Antechinus arktos
differs clearly from all other antechinus species, in having a combination of large-bodied, very shaggy and black-tailed appearance.
A. arktos
is more vibrantly coloured than
A. swainsonii
. A. s. mimetes
is more uniformly deep brown-black to grizzled grey-brown from head to rump, with brownish (clove brown – raw umber) hair on the upper surface of the hindfoot and tail, whereas
A. arktos
is more colourful, having a marked change from greyish-brown head to orange-brown toned rump, fuscous black on the upper surface of the hindfoot and dense, short fur on the evenly black tail. Further, there is no distinct eye-ring but
A. arktos
has marked orange-brown fur on the upper and lower eyelid, cheek and in front of the ear and very long guard hairs all over the body, giving it a distinctively shaggy appearance; these characters, in specimens where they exist, are more subtle in
A. swainsonii
.
Summary of craniodental differences amongst congeners.
A. arktos
skulls are strikingly different to all subspecies of
A. swainsonii
.
A. arktos
are markedly larger than
A. s. mimetes
and
A. s.
swainsonii
(
Tasmania
)
for a range of craniodental measures, in particular: breadth across the snout, but with shorter anterior palatal vacuities and larger inter-palatal vacuity distance. Compared to all
A. swainsonii
subspecies,
A. arktos
skulls are most similar in size to
A. s. insulanus
from Grampians NP,
Victoria
. Nevertheless, there are a range of skull characters that differ between
A. arktos
and
A. s. insulanus
:
A. arktos
tend to have smaller upper second molar teeth but broader skulls, shorter anterior palatal vacuities and longer posterior palatal vacuities than
A. s. insulanus
.