Pogonomys loriae Thomas 1897

Pogonomys loriae Thomas 1897, Ann. Mus . Civ. Stor. Nat. Genova, 18: 613.

Type Locality: Papua New Guinea, Central Province, mountains behind Astrolabe Range, near Mt Wori, Haveri, 700 m (Laurie and Hill, 1954:96, provided details).

Vernacular Names: Loria's Pogonomys.

Synonyms: Pogonomys dryas Thomas 1904 .

Distribution: New Guinea; Recorded only from the Vogelkop and Weyland Range in Prov. of Papua (= Irian Jaya), but widespread in Papua New Guinea from the Telefomin area in the west through the Central Cordillera to the E flanks of the Owen Stanley Range in the east; also found in the N coastal Torricelli Mtns, the Huon Peninsula and the upper Fly River drainage; 100-3000 m (Flannery, 1995 a and Dennis and Menzies, 1979:328).

Conservation: IUCN – Lower Risk (lc).

Discussion: Until the revision by Dennis and Menzies (1979), this species was known as P. mollipilosus (Tate, 1951), but the holotype of that taxon is a P. macrourus (see account of that species). Dennis and Menzies (1979) also included fergussoniensis from the D’Entrecasteaux Isls, which we separate as a distinct species (see that account). Pogonomys loriae has traditionally been considered to be montane, occurring "generally over 1500 m," (Dennis and Menzies, 1979:330), which is generally accurate but there are interesting exceptions. Five specimens listed by Tate (1951) from the upper Fly River near the foothills of the Central Cordillera were collected at about 100 m, which is the lowest record of the species. Flannery (1995a:316) noted that "In northern New Guinea it is restricted to a narrow elevational band of between approximately 200 and 800 metres. Above this, it is replaced by Pogonomys macrourus ." This is unusual because elsewhere P. macrourus is found in lowlands and mid-elevations and is usually replaced at higher elevations by P. loriae . Most of the distributional records of P. loriae are from Papua New Guinea. The species has not been recorded from the Snow Mtns (Pegunungan Maoke), that vast Central Cordillera of Prov. of Papua (= Irian Jaya), despite intensive collecting activity in places. For example, members of the 1938-1939 Archbold Expedition to the N slope of the Snow Mtns obtained about 2400 mammals representing 68 indigenous species of echidna, marsupials, bats, and rodents, but did not encounter P. loriae (Musser and Lunde, ms). If the absence of P. loriae from the Snow Mtns is real and not an artifact of collecting, its overall distribution would be roughly concordant with that described for P. sylvestris (Musser and Lunde, ms; see account of that species). Cole et al. (1997) reported P. loriae to be common on the E flanks of Mt Dayman, noting that P. loriae was usually found up to 1600 m and replaced above that altitude by P. sylvestris, although they overlap between 1000 and 2000 m. There is much to learn about altitudinal and geographic distribution of P. loriae throughout New Guinea.