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1 October 2004 NOTES ON THE PHALANGERID MARSUPIAL GENUS SPILOCUSCUS, WITH DESCRIPTION OF A NEW SPECIES FROM PAPUA
Kristofer M. Helgen, Timothy F. Flannery
Author Affiliations +
Abstract

A new small-bodied species of spotted cuscus is described from Biak and Supiori, neighboring oceanic islands in Cenderawasih Bay, northwest New Guinea. The nonvolant mammal fauna of Biak-Supiori is almost entirely endemic. The geographic origin of another insular species of the genus (Spilocuscus kraemeri) is also discussed: S. kraemeri is a distinctive species known only from the Admiralty Islands but, due to its putative absence from the fossil record of those islands, it is thought to have been introduced there from an unknown source population in prehistoric times. Based on new evidence, we suggest that kraemeri is either native to the Admiralty Islands, or originally differentiated on the large island of New Britain in the Bismarck Archipelago.

Kristofer M. Helgen and Timothy F. Flannery "NOTES ON THE PHALANGERID MARSUPIAL GENUS SPILOCUSCUS, WITH DESCRIPTION OF A NEW SPECIES FROM PAPUA," Journal of Mammalogy 85(5), 825-833, (1 October 2004). https://doi.org/10.1644/BER-110
Accepted: 1 December 2003; Published: 1 October 2004
KEYWORDS
Admiralty Islands
Biak-Supiori
Bismarck Archipelago
Indonesia
marsupials
Papua New Guinea
Phalangeridae
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