Zuniga's Dark Rice Rat
Encyclopedia
Melanomys zunigae, also known as Zuniga's Melanomys or Zuniga's Dark Rice Rat, is a species of rodent
Rodent
Rodentia is an order of mammals also known as rodents, characterised by two continuously growing incisors in the upper and lower jaws which must be kept short by gnawing....
in the genus Melanomys
Melanomys
Melanomys is a genus of rodent in the tribe Oryzomyini of family Cricetidae, which is distributed in northern South America and adjacent Central America. It contains three species, two of which—Melanomys robustulus and Melanomys zunigae—have limited distributions...
of family Cricetidae
Cricetidae
The Cricetidae are a family of rodents in the large and complex superfamily Muroidea. It includes true hamsters, voles, lemmings, and New World rats and mice...
. Known only from a small region of coastal Peru, it is listed as "critically endangered" by the IUCN and may even be extinct.
Literature cited
- Musser, G.G. and Carleton, M.D. 2005. Superfamily Muroidea. Pp. 894–1531 in Wilson, D.E. and Reeder, D.M. (eds.). Mammal Species of the World: a taxonomic and geographic reference. 3rd ed. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2 vols., 2142 pp. ISBN 978-0-8018-8221-0
- Zeballos, H. and Vivar, E. 2008. . In IUCN. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2009.2. <www.iucnredlist.org>. Downloaded on November 15, 2009.