black-footed pygmy rice rat

About the black-footed pygmy rice rat

Oligoryzomys nigripes, also known as the black-footed colilargo or the black-footed pygmy rice rat, is a rodent in the genus Oligoryzomys of family Cricetidae. Oligoryzomys nigripes is a species that has been further divided into different sister taxa throughout history. It is found in different countries in South America. It is a large species with long ears, dark yellow to dark brown upperparts, sharply delimited from the whitish underparts, and often a pink girdle on the chest. This species of rat spends much of its life among the trees. The karyotype is 2n = 62, FNa = 78–82.

Two other species, Oligoryzomys delticola (also known as the delta pygmy rice rat or the large colilargo) and Oligoryzomys eliurus (also known as the Brazilian pygmy rice rat or the Brazilian colilargo) have been recognized as synonyms of O. nigripes since 2005; they cannot be distinguished on the basis of morphology, karyotype, or morphometrics.

Oligoryzomys nigripes is found from Pernambuco in northeastern Brazil through the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado into Paraguay, Uruguay, and Argentina, where it occurs in the provinces of Chaco, Misiones, and Buenos Aires. Wikipedia →