The lesser bilby (Macrotis leucura), also known as the yallara, the lesser rabbit-eared bandicoot or the white-tailed rabbit-eared bandicoot, was a rabbit-like marsupial. The species was first described by Oldfield Thomas as Peregale leucura in 1887 from a single specimen from a collection of mammals of the British Museum.[3] Reaching the size of a young rabbit, this species lived in the deserts of Central Australia. Since the 1950s–1960s, it has been believed to be extinct.
A description of the species by Oldfield Thomas was published in 1887, using a specimen forwarded to the British Museum "J. Beazley" of Adelaide, collected at an unknown location; the author determined that the source of the specimen was from the Northern Territory or the vicinity of the southern city of Adelaide. Oldfield Thomas recognized an affinity with the "rabbit-bandicoot" Macrotis lagotis, then described by the genus Peragale, but found distinctions in the specimens that described a new species.[2]
Several later descriptions are synonymous with this species, H. H. Finlayson proposed a new subspecies as Thalacomys minor miseliusin 1932, based on specimens collected at the lower Diamantina, at Cooncherie, and acknowledged the description of Peragale minor by Baldwin Spencer in 1897,[4] also recognised as a synonym.[5] The treatment of the genus was again reviewed by Finlayson in 1935.[6]
The names for the species include white-tailed bilby.[7]
Description
Illustration of a lesser bilby
The lesser bilby was a medium-sized marsupial with a body mass of 300–435 grams, a combined head-body length of 200–270 millimetres and tail from 120 to 170mm.[7][8] Its fur colour ranged from pale yellowish-brown to grey-brown with pale white or yellowish-white fur on its belly, with white limbs and tail.[8][9] The tail of this animal was long, about 70% of its total head-body length.
Macrotis have long fur with a silky texture, the species have long tails and mobile ears that resemble those of a common rabbit (lagomorphs); they are burrowing animals that have long and narrow muzzles. The overall coloration of this species was more subdued than the bilby, Macrotis lagotis, and smaller in size; the shorter ears of M. leucura measured 63mm from base to tip. The underside of the tail had a greyish patch at the base, but the long and bushy fur is otherwise white.[7]
An illustration reconstructing the animal in its native setting was painted by Peter Schouten.
Distribution and habitat
Very little is known about its former range and distribution, as the species was collected only six times in modern history, with the first of these coming from an unknown region.[10]
It preferred to live in sandy and loamy deserts, spinifex sandplains and dunes, dominated by mounds of tough and grassy Triodia species with mulga Acacia aneura, zygochloa canegrass ,[8] or in Triodia hummock grassland with occasional low trees and shrubs.[1]
Ecology and behaviour
The lesser bilby, like its surviving relatives, was a strictly nocturnal animal. It was an omnivore feeding on ants, termites, roots,[8] seeds,[11] but it also hunted and fed on introduced rodents.
It burrowed in dunes, constructing burrowstwoto three metres (7–10ft) deep and closing the entrance with loose sand by day. It is suggested that it may have bred non-seasonally[12] and that giving birth to twins was normal for this species.[11]
Unlike its living relative the greater bilby, the lesser bilby was described as aggressive and tenacious. Hedley Finlayson wrote that this animal was "fierce and intractable, and repulsed the most tactful attempts to handle them by repeated savage snapping bites and harsh hissing sounds".
A collector in the northern territory reported the name used by his Aboriginal informants, Urpila, that distinguished this species from M. lagotis (Urgata), and noted their particular habits. This species would not reside in the deep and narrow part of its burrow in cooler seasons, remaining a short distance from the entrance; this habit was exploited by hunters who would collapse the tunnel behind their prey to force it toward the soft sand covering the opening of the burrow.[4]
Extinction
The spinifex-covered landscape of the Gibson Desert was the native habitat of the lesser bilby.
Since its discovery in 1887, the species was rarely seen or collected and remained relatively unknown to science. In 1931, Finlayson encountered many of them near Cooncherie Station, collecting 12 live specimens.[13] Although according to Finlayson this animal was abundant in that area,[11] these were the last lesser bilbies to be collected alive.
A single specimen collected to the north of Charlotte Waters was deposited at the museum in Melbourne and examined by Balwin Spencer in 1897, not recognizing it as this species. The collector of Spencer's animal, Patrick Michael Byrne, obtained the specimens with some difficulty.[4]
The last specimen ever found was a skull picked up below a wedge-tailed eagle's nest in 1967 at Steele Gap in the Simpson Desert, Northern Territory.[13] The bones were estimated as being under 15 years old.[14]
Indigenous Australian oral tradition suggests that this species possibly survived into the 1960s.[1]
The decline in numbers of the lesser bilby and ultimately its extinction was attributed to several different factors. The introductions of foreign predators like the domestic cat and fox, being hunted for food by Indigenous Australians,[9]competition with rabbits for food[citation needed], changes in the fire regime[clarification needed] and the degradation of habitat[1] have all been blamed for the extinction of this species. However, Jane Thornback and Martin Jenkins suggested in their book that the vegetation in the main part of its range remained intact, with little evidence of cattle or rabbit grazing and point to cats and foxes as the most likely cause of the extinction of the lesser bilby.[10]
Related Research Articles
Macrotis is a genus of desert-dwelling marsupial omnivores known as bilbies or rabbit-bandicoots; they are members of the order Peramelemorphia. At the time of European colonisation of Australia, there were two species. The lesser bilby became extinct in the 1950s; the greater bilby survives but remains endangered. It is currently listed as a vulnerable species. It is on average 55 cm (22 in) long, excluding the tail, which is usually around 29 cm (11 in) long. Its fur is usually grey or white, it has a long pointy nose and very long ears, hence earning its nick-name, the rabbit-eared bandicoot.
The greater bilby, often referred to simply as the bilby since the lesser bilby became extinct in the 1950s, is an Australian species of nocturnal omnivorous animal in the order Peramelemorphia. Other vernacular names include dalgyte, pinkie, or rabbit-eared bandicoot. Greater bilbies live in arid parts of northwestern and central Australia. Their range and population is in decline.
The order Peramelemorphia includes the bandicoots and bilbies; it equates approximately to the mainstream of marsupial omnivores. All members of the order are endemic to the twin land masses of Australia-New Guinea and most have the characteristic bandicoot shape: a plump, arch-backed body with a long, delicately tapering snout, very large upright ears, relatively long, thin legs, and a thin tail. Their size varies from about 140 grams up to 4 kilograms, but most species are about one kilogram, or the weight of a half-grown kitten.
Bandicoots are a group of more than 20 species of small to medium-sized, terrestrial, largely nocturnal marsupial omnivores in the order Peramelemorphia. They are endemic to the Australia–New Guinea region, including the Bismarck Archipelago to the east and Seram and Halmahera to the west.
The broad-faced potoroo(Potorous platyops) is an extinct potoroid marsupial that was found in southwestern Australia. The first specimen was collected in 1839, and described by John Gould in 1844. Only a small number of specimens have been collected since. The last live capture was in 1875. Subfossil remains indicate that it had an extensive distribution around the semiarid coastal districts of Southwest Australia.
The desert bandicoot is an extinct bandicoot of the arid country in the centre of Australia.
The southern pig-footed bandicoot was a small species of herbivorous marsupial in the genus Chaeropus, the pig-footed bandicoots.
The kowari, also known by its Diyari name kariri, is a small carnivorous marsupial native to the gibber deserts of central Australia. It is monotypic; the sole member of genus Dasyuroides.
Chaeropus, known as the pig-footed bandicoots, is a genus of small mammals that became extinct during the twentieth century. They were unique marsupials, of the order Peramelemorphia, with unusually thin legs yet were able to move rapidly. Two recognised species inhabited dense vegetation on the arid and semi-arid plains of Australia. The genus' distribution range was later reduced to an inland desert region, where it was last recorded in the 1950s; it is now presumed extinct.
The marsupial family Peramelidae contains all of the extant bandicoots. They are found throughout Australia and New Guinea, with at least some species living in every available habitat, from rainforest to desert. Four fossil peramelids are described. One known extinct species of bandicoot, the pig-footed bandicoot, was so different from the other species, it was recently moved into its own family.
The golden bandicoot is a short-nosed bandicoot found in northern Australia. It is the smallest of its genus.
The Western barred bandicoot, also known as the Marl, is a small species of bandicoot; now extinct across most of its former range, the western barred bandicoot only survives on offshore islands and in fenced sanctuaries on the mainland.
The northern marsupial mole or kakarratul is a marsupial in the family Notoryctidae, an endemic animal of arid regions of Central Australia. It lives in the loose sand of dunes and river plains in the desert, spending nearly its entire life beneath ground. The facial features are reduced or absent, their small and strong body, weighing little more the 30 grams, is extremely specialised to moving through sand in search of prey. The species is elusive and it is one of the most poorly understood mammals of Australia.
Crash bandicoot is an extinct bandicoot, known from fossils located at the Riversleigh World Heritage Area in northeast Australia.
Liyamayi dayi is a mammal species of the Thylacomyidae family known from fossils located at the Riversleigh World Heritage Area in northeast Australia. The discovery of the specimens was identified as deposited around fifteen million years ago, revising the earliest record of this peramelemorphian lineage from those of species that existed around ten million years later.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
