. Bonner zoologische Monographien. Zoology. 229. : Pairwise Jaccard's similarities of mammal assemblages between adjacent elevational units of the Harenna Forest. The distinctive, olive-brown Mus from the Harenna was assigned to M. triton (Yalden 1988 a). However, our detailed cytogenetic study (Aniskin et al. 1998) does not support this identification. Moreover, Mus cf. triton from the Harenna Forest, together with the widespread Ethiopian M. mahomet, belongs to the cytotaxonomic group that does not include the true M. triton and is characterised by primitive acrocentric heterochromosome
. Bonner zoologische Monographien. Zoology. 229. : Pairwise Jaccard's similarities of mammal assemblages between adjacent elevational units of the Harenna Forest. The distinctive, olive-brown Mus from the Harenna was assigned to M. triton (Yalden 1988 a). However, our detailed cytogenetic study (Aniskin et al. 1998) does not support this identification. Moreover, Mus cf. triton from the Harenna Forest, together with the widespread Ethiopian M. mahomet, belongs to the cytotaxonomic group that does not include the true M. triton and is characterised by primitive acrocentric heterochromosomes (for review, see Capanna 1985). So, all three endemic Harenna species originated apparently from aboriginal non-forest stocks and their resemblance to some species from other forest territories might be a result of convergence. Further, the arboreal browser Heterohyrax brucei found in the Harenna Forest occupies the ecological niche of a Dendrohyrax species. A comparison with sizable material in the Koninklijk Museum voor Midden-Afrika (Tervuren) reveals that the Harenna Heterohyrax resembles Dendrohyrax arboreus in teeth pattern (but possesses the other main diagnostic cranial features of Heterohyrax), which may be a result of this ecological shift. It is noteworthy that Kingdon (1971) assumed a direct origin of Dendrohyrax validus from some ancestral Heterohyrax population. The Harenna Forest is the southernmost limit for the essentially Palaearctic species Plecotus austriacus. It is interesting that the Harenna Plecotus differs strikingly in its colour pattern from the neighbouring Arabian - North African subspecies christii and resembles conspecific specimens from more humid European areas. It thus seems clear that the mammalian fauna of the Harenna Forest was formed rather recently and mainly through two different processes: a limited immigration of forest species and the recruitment of species from adjacent altitudinal zones (savanna and moorland) with their subsequent
Size: 2020px × 1237px
Photo credit: © Library Book Collection / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookcollectionbiodiversity, booksubjectzoology
