Nephelomys albigularis

Description

Nephelomys albigularis, also known as the white-throated oryzomys or Tomes's rice rat, is a species of rodent in the genus Nephelomys of family Cricetidae. Described in 1860, it was the first Nephelomys species to be discovered. It was originally described in the defunct genus Hesperomys as Hesperomys albigularis and considered related to the much smaller H. longicaudatus (currently Oligoryzomys longicaudatus). By 1894, it was placed in Oryzomys, as Oryzomys albigularis, and associated with what is now Nephelomys meridensis. In the early 1960s, the scope of the species was considerably expanded to include most of the species that are now in Nephelomys, as well as a single name, boliviae, that is currently a synonym of Euryoryzomys nitidus. From 1976 on, several of these were reinstated as separate species. In 2006, a phylogenetic analysis by Marcelo Weksler of the oryzomyine tribe, in which both Oryzomys and Nephelomys are classified, provided strong evidence that Oryzomys as recognized then was a polyphyletic genus. O. albigularis and one of its former synonyms, O. levipes, were included; they consistently clustered into a single group within a larger group that included species now placed in Hylaeamys, Euryoryzomys, Transandinomys, Handleyomys, and Oecomys. Accordingly, the group of species around O. albigularis was reclassified into a new genus, Nephelomys, with albigularis as its type species. Since then, the species has been known as Nephelomys albigularis. Of the seven synonyms still placed under N. albigularis in 2005, five were reclassified as separate species, N. childi, N. maculiventer, N. moerex, N. pectoralis, and N. pirrensis, one (oconnelli) was placed under N. childi, and the last (villosus) was not mentioned. Before the other five species were recognized as separate, it was recorded as being distributed from northern Peru via the Andes of Ecuador and Colombia into eastern Panama and northwestern Venezuela. No revised distribution has been published taking into account the recognition of the other species. These have type localities in Panama, Colombia, and western Ecuador; the type locality of N. albigularis itself is also in Ecuador. It is known from montane forest at altitudes of 900 to 3300 m. It is nocturnal and omnivorous.