Zyzomys pedunculatus (Waite 1896)

[Zyzomys] pedunculatus (Waite 1896), Rept. Horn Sci. Exped. Cent. Aust., Zool., Vol. 2: 395.

Type Locality: Australia, Northern Territory, Alice Springs, but this locality is suspect (Kitchener, 1989; see also Mahoney and Richardson, 1988:191).

Vernacular Names: Central Australian Rock Rat.

Synonyms: Zyzomys brachyotis (Waite 1896) .

Distribution: C Australia; Northern Territory (Watts and Aslin, 1981:143; Wurst, 1995:625).

Conservation: CITES – Appendix I; U.S. ESA – Endangered; IUCN – Critically Endangered.

Discussion: Rare and restricted to rocks. Distribution of fossils indicated species "may once have extended across the rocky ranges of central Western Australia, through the Hamersleys to the coast" (Watts and Aslin, 1981:143). This "is either one of Australia’s rarest rodents or its most recently extinct mammal.... The last specimen was collected in 1960 by a stockman in the Western MacDonnell Ranges near Mount Leibig, about 300 kilometres west of Alice Springs, while it was attempting to break into the camp food supplies." (Wurst, 1995:624). Recently the species has been rediscovered living in two national parks in the Northern Territory (Wurst, 1997, who also provided first photograph of the live animal).