Coendou quichua Thomas, 1899

Voss, Robert S., 2011, Revisionary Notes on Neotropical Porcupines (Rodentia: Erethizontidae) 3. An Annotated Checklist of the Species of Coendou Lacépède, 1799, American Museum Novitates 2011 (3720), pp. 1-1 : 1-

Coendou quichua Thomas, 1899

Coendou quichua Thomas, 1899: 283 ; type locality “ Puembo , Upper Guallabamba River, Province of Pichincha, Ecuador.”

Coendou rothschildi Thomas, 1902c: 169 ; type locality allegedly “Sevilla Island, off Chiriqui, Panama,” but this information is fraudulent according to Olson (2008), who claimed that the type was probably collected near Boquerón on the adjacent mainland of Chiriquí province, Panama .

Coendou quichua richardsoni J.A. Allen, 1913: 478 ; type locality “ Esmeraldas (near sea level), Ecuador.”

Coendou (Coendou) quichua quichua: Tate, 1935: 306 (name combination).

Coendou (Coendou) quichua richardsoni: Tate, 1935: 306 (name combination).

Coendou (Coendou) rothschildi: Tate, 1935: 306 (name combination).

Coendou (Coendou) bicolor quichua: Cabrera, 1961: 598 (name combination).

Coendou (Coendou) bicolor richardsoni: Cabrera, 1961: 598 (name combination).

DISTRIBUTION: I have examined specimens of Coendou quichua from Panama, western Ecuador (Cotopaxi, Esmeraldas, Pichincha), and trans-Andean Colombia (Cesar, Cundinamarca). Alberico et al. (1999) reported several Colombian specimens (from Chocó and Santander) that I have not seen. Altitudes recorded on specimen labels suggest that the species ranges from sea level to about 3300 m .

REMARKS: Coendou quichua was treated as a subspecies of C. bicolor by Cabrera (1961), and it is still listed as such by Woods and Kilpatrick (2005). However, it is not clear whether or not Cabrera, Woods, or Kilpatrick ever examined specimens of these strikingly dissimilar taxa. Among other conspicuous differences, C. quichua is substantially smaller than C. bicolor ( tables 4, 8), its longest quills are usually tricolored (all of the quills are normally bicolored in C. bicolor ), its frontal sinuses are not or only slightly inflated (the frontal sinuses are always inflated in large adults of C. bicolor ), and the roof of its external auditory meatus usually has a