Rhipidomys leucodactylus Tschudi 1845

Rhipidomys leucodactylus Tschudi 1845, Untersuchungen uber die Fauna peruana (Therologie): 183.

Type Locality: Perú, Region Andrés Avelino Cáceres (former Junín Dept.), Montaña de Vítoc area (as restricted by Tribe, 1996:201).

Vernacular Names: White-footed Rhipidomys.

Synonyms: Rhipidomys aratayae Guillotin and Petter 1984; Rhipidomys bovallii Thomas 1911; Rhipidomys equatoris Thomas 1915; Rhipidomys goodfellowi Thomas 1900; Rhipidomys lucullus Thomas 1911; Rhipidomys rex Thomas 1927; Rhipidomys sclateri (Thomas 1887) .

Distribution: Guianas, S Venezuela, N and C Brazil, Ecuador, Perú, and WC Bolivia (see Anderson, 1993); extralimital in W Ecuador and NW Perú.

Conservation: IUCN – Lower Risk (lc).

Discussion: R. leucodactylus section sensu Tribe (1996). The homogeneity of junior epithets and populations gathered under R. leucodactylus, especially those west of the Andes, should be tested with other data and new collections. Thomas (1887 b), e.g., named sclateri as a species from British Guiana and viewed it as the eastern counterpart of Peruvian R. leucodactylus; Guillotin and Petter (1984), however, described aratayae as a subspecies of R. leucodactylus from French Guiana; Voss et al. (2001) provisionally accepted both as examples of R. leucodactylus . Morphology and karyotype of W Brazil samples characterized by Patton et al. (2000), who compared the species with R. gardneri .