Vol. 36 No. 1, 1997

Re-evaluation of the Status of Chodsigoa sodalis Thomas, 1913 (Mammalia: Insectivora: Soricidae)

Masaharu Motokawa^1,*, Hon-Tsen Yu², Yin-Ping  Fang², Hsi-Chi Cheng³, Liang-Kong Lin⁴ and  Masashi Harada⁴

¹Dept. of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Kyoto Univ., Kyoto 606-01, Japan
²Dept. of Zoology, National Taiwan Univ., Taipei, Taiwan 106
³Division of Zoology, Taiwan Endemic Species Research Inst., Nantou County, Taiwan 552
⁴Lab. of Wildlife Ecology, Dept. of Biology, Tunghai Univ., Taichung, Taiwan 407
⁵Lab. Animal Center, Osaka City Univ. Medical School, Osaka 545, Japan

Masaharu Motokawa, Hon-Tsen Yu, Yin-Ping Fang, Hsi-Chi Cheng, Liang-Kong Lin and Masashi Harada (1997) In 1913 Thomas described the shrew Chodsigoa sodalis from Taiwan based on only 1 skull. This species has been regarded as a synonym of  Soriculus (Episoriculus) fumidus Thomas,1913 because of insufficient information. The diagnostic features of Soriculus (Chodsigoa) sodalis, such as 3 upper unicuspid teeth, have been considered as a variation of S. (E.) fumidus. Recently we obtained 4 additional specimens from montane areas of Taiwan. In this paper, we confirm S. (C.) sodalisas a valid species and describe its external features for the first time.

Key words: Soriculus (Chodsigoa) sodalis, Soriculus (Episoriculus) fumidus,Taiwan, Taxonomy.

*Correspondence: Tel: 81-75-753-4099, Fax: 81-75-753-4114