Petromyscus collinus (Thomas and Hinton 1925)

[Praomys] collinus Thomas and Hinton 1925, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1925: 237.

Type Locality: Namibia, Damaraland, Karibib, northwest of Windhoek, 3142 ft (958 m).

Vernacular Names: Pygmy Rock Mouse.

Synonyms: Petromyscus bruchus (Thomas and Hinton 1925); Petromyscus capensis Shortridge and Carter 1938; Petromyscus kaokoensis Roberts 1938; Petromyscus kurzi Lehmann 1955; Petromyscus namibensis Roberts 1948; Petromyscus rufus Lundholm 1955; Petromyscus variabilis Lundholm 1955 .

Distribution: SW Angola (along the Inselberge belt between Namib and mopani areas; Crawford-Cabral, 1966 b, 1998) and Kaokoveld region in N Namibia, south through Namibia, to W Limpopo of South Africa south of the Orange River in Goodhouse and Pella areas; also recorded from Western Cape Prov.

Conservation: IUCN – Lower Risk (lc).

Discussion: Reviewed by Skinner and Smithers (1990) and de Graaff (1997 jj). Roberts (1951) listed capensis, known only from Goodhouse, as a species, and Meester et al. (1986) treated it as a full synonym of P. collinus barbouri . In arranging capensis as a subspecies of P. collinus, however, Shortridge and Carter (1938) properly reflected its affinity and appreciated that its morphology is unlike P. barbouri, which they described in the same paper and knew well. Roberts (1951) also treated bruchus (S Namibia, Great Brukkaros Mtn) as a separate species, merging the northern shortridgei as a subspecies. The latter is clearly a species separate from P. collinus (see comments under shortridgei), but the status of bruchus will have to be illuminated in a revision; the few specimens we have seen from Great Brukkaros Mtn are examples of P. collinus .