Notomys macrotis
| Big-eared hopping mouse | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Subphylum: | Vertebrata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Rodentia |
| Family: | Muridae |
| Subfamily: | Murinae |
| Genus: | Notomys |
| Species: | N. macrotis |
| Binomial name | |
|
Notomys macrotis Thomas, 1921 |
|
The big-eared hopping mouse (Notomys macrotis) is an extinct species of mouse, which lived in the Moore River area of south-western Australia. The big-eared hopping mouse was a small, rat-sized animal resembling a tiny kangaroo. It had large eyes and ears with a brush-tipped tail. It moved on its four legs when traveling at a slower pace, or by bounding upon its enlarged, padded, hind feet when traveling quickly. They mainly lived in sand dunes or nests made of leaves and other organic materials, which attributed to the “morphological and physiological adaptations” of the elongated hind feet and brush-tipped tail to increase agility through such an environment (Breed 21). The big-eared hopping mouse was among many hopping mice to be extinct, and its absence from extensive sub-fossil collections suggests it was restricted to Western Australia (Burbidge, 618).
Of the six taxa with ranges limited to Western Australia, five are considered threatened or vulnerable and one, the big-eared hopping mouse, is extinct. Under the Western Australian Wildlife Conservation Act of 1950, the hopping mouse is listed as “fauna presumed to be extinct” and under Commonwealth legislation, simply “extinct”. We only know about the hopping mouse from two damaged specimen: one from which the location it was found in is unknown and one at Moore River in Western Australia. The last record dates from 19 July 1843 and was collected in Perth around the Moore River and King George’s Sound by John Gilbert, who was employed by John Gould. Land around the Moore originally consisted of coastal heathland, woodland, and forest. Gilbert focused primarily on rodent species, but collected several rodent species, including Notomys macrotis. It is known from two damaged specimens held in the Natural History Museum, London. There is speculation as to whether the species was last collected in July 1843, for in the 19th and early 20th centuries there was an absence of scientific data in the area of which the big-eared hopping mouse inhabited. Drying conditions throughout much of the continent of Australia likely account for the relatively poor Miocene fossil record.
The Murid rodents likely entered northern Australia from Southeast Asia through relatively dry corridors sometime between 8 and 5 million years ago, during the late Miocene. Perhaps during this period, many modern groups of rodents underwent explosive radiations to produce the high diversity of species lineages that are present today, including the big-eared hopping mouse. The order Rodentia of mammals has an extensive non-Australian representation and almost certainly arrived as diversified groups with closer phylogenetic relationships to non-Australian mammals. During the Pliocene period, directly following the Miocene period, mammal communities In Australia began to change as a result of this fairly recent influx of new orders and families, which would have included the big-eared hopping mouse.
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