Apodemus latronum Thomas 1911

Apodemus latronum Thomas 1911, Abstr. Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 100: 49.

Type Locality: China, W Szechwan, Tatsienlu.

Vernacular Names: Large-eared Field Mouse.

Distribution: S China (E Xizang, Yunnan, Sichuan, and Qinghai) and N Burma (Ellerman, 1961; Feng et al., 1986; Musser et al., 1996; Wang, 2003; Zhang et al., 1997).

Conservation: IUCN – Lower Risk (lc).

Discussion: Apodemus group. Usually placed in subgenus Alsomys (Pavlinov et al., 1995 a); included in an Apodemus group by Musser et al. (1996). Treated as a subspecies of A. draco by Feng et al. (1986), but A. latronum is a separate species that is sympatric with A. draco in Sichuan, Yunnan, and NE Burma (Musser et al., 1996). Karyotype reported by Chen et al. (1996). Analysis of protein electrophoresis aligns A. latronum with A. draco and not A. chevrieri, the only three species in the study (Bing et al., 1996), an alliance also reflected by morphology. Phylogenetic analyses of mtDNA cytochrome b and nuclear IRBP sequences united A. latronum in a clade with A. draco and A. semotus that is part of a larger lineage containing A. agrarius, A. chevrieri, A. peninsulae, and A. speciosus (Suzuki et al., 2003; also see account of A. draco). Musser et al. (1996) reviewed taxonomic history, morphology, relationships, and listed localities and specimens from China (Sichuan and Yunnan) and NE Burma. Evolutionary history extends back to the early Pleistocene as documented by fossils from cave sediments in the Sichuan-Guizhou region of S China (Zheng, 1993) and fissure deposits in Shandong (Zheng et al., 1997).