Vol. XXVIII, pp. 115-116 May 27, 1915 



PROCEEDINGS 



OF THE 



BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 



A NEW SQUIRREL FROM NORTHEASTERN CHINA. 



BY GERRIT 8. MILLER, Jr. 

 [Published here by permission of the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution.] 



During February, 1915, Mr. Arthur de C. Sowerby visited 

 the recently opened hunting reserve in a well wooded region 

 about sixty miles northeast of Peking. Here he took five speci- 

 mens of a squirrel of the genus Tamiops, no member of which 

 has hitherto been known to occur in northeastern China. The 

 animals, he writes, are almost entirely arboreal in habits, living 

 in holes in the oak trees. They are very active, taking enor- 

 mous leaps from one tree to another. The species is readily 

 distinguishable from those previously described. 



Tamiops vestltus sp. nov. 



Type — Adult male, with moderately worn teeth (skin and skull), No. 

 199,561, United States National Museum. Collected by Arthur de C. 

 Sowerby at Hsin-lung-shan, south of Jehol and 65 miles northeast of 

 Pekinor, China, February 15, 1915. Original number 754. 



Diagnosis. — Size maximum for the genus; fur dense and soft, its 

 quality suggesting that of a flying squirrel ; general color pale and grayish ; 

 a broad median blackish stripe and two broad pale lateral stripes, all 

 becoming abruptly indistinct at shoulder, but fading away gradually to 

 root of tail. 



Color. — Sides of body below outer pale stripe a light gray between 

 drab-gray and pale-drab-gray of Ridgway, passing into dull pale-pinkish- 

 bufi' on underparts and cheeks, and into a distinctly brighter buflf on 

 crown, neck and shoulders, this area slightly clouded by blackish hair- 

 tips; crown somewhat more brownish and reddish than neck, approach- 

 ing a rich tawny-olive; ear bufTy on inner side, blacki.sh along rim, huffy 

 white on outer surface (the whitish hairs elongated to form noticeable 

 tuft); median dorsal stripe blackish, about 7 mm. wide at middle, ending 

 abruptly at shoulder but fading and narrowing gradually to base of tail; 

 first lateral pale stripe essentially concolor with buff of neck, but without 



20— Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash., Vol. XXVIII. 1915. (115) 



