Cavia porcellus (Linnaeus, 1758) . Syst. Nat., 10th ed., 1:59.

TYPE LOCALITY: Brazil, Pernambuco (questionable) .

DISTRIBUTION: Domesticated worldwide; possibly feral in N South America.

SYNONYMS: anolaimae, cobaya; cutleri Bennett, 1836; leucopyga Cabanis, 1848; longipilis.

COMMENTS: Husson (1978:451) reserved the use of porcellus to denote domesticated guinea pigs, which are probably derived from tschudii (Corbet and Hill, 1991:201), but also see Hiickinghaus (1961:96), who regarded porcellus as a synonym of aperea . This species may be a domesticated animal with no established wild population. K. F. Koopman (pers. comm.) believes that N South American populations may be feral domestic guinea pigs; but see comment under aperea .