406 



"THE" COMMON STRIPED PALM SQUIRREL. 



By R. C. Wroughton, f.z.s. 



(With a Plate.) 



{Read before the Bombay Natural History Society on 6th July 1905.) 



Blanford in his " Mammals" describes the common striped palm 

 squirrel under the name of Sciurus palmarum, L. 



Since the " Mammals" was published, however, Mr. Thomas, in the 

 P. Z. S. (1897, p. 925), referring to a paper published by Dr. Forsyth 

 Major, on the subdivisions of the Sciuridai (P. Z. S., 1893, p. 179), 

 wrote : — " This general arrangement being founded on such a careful 

 and highly competent examination of the skulls and teeth, it was 



evident that systematic workers would have to consider how 



best they could utilise Dr. Major's invaluable contribution to the 

 subje t 1 would now venture to suggest that all thr sub- 

 genera (with the exception of Atlantoxerus) in Dr. Major's scheme 

 should be recognised, for ordinary systematic purposes, as full genera, 

 especially as all of them have long been considered as perfectly natural 

 groups and have been arranged as such in the revisions of Trouessart 

 and other authors."' Again in the "Ann : and Mag :" (1898, Ser. 7, Vol. 

 II, p. 249), Mr. Thomas wrote : — '' For the information of workers in 

 the East, to whom all the literature may not be accessible, it may be 

 noted that by the recent splitting up of Sciurus into several genera 



the Indian squirrels — taking Blanford's 'Mammals' as a 



standard — S. bicolor, indicus, macrurus belong to Batufa ; the species 

 (except rufigenis and lohriah) from ferrugineus to atridorsalis and also 

 maclellandi to Sciurus ; and S. rufigenis, lokriah, palmarum. tristriatus, 

 layardi, sublineatus, and berdmorei to Funambulus." 



Hence in the Table on p. 370 of the " Mammals " if lohriah and rufi- 

 genis h& put under C and maclellandi under B. we shall have — 



A = Gen. Batufa. 



B = Gen. Sciurus. 



C = Gen. Funambulus. 

 As a first step then our common striped palm squirrel becomes 

 Funambulus palmarum. But, since I obtained, in 1898, two striped 

 squirrels, within \ mile of each other, on the north bank of the Tap'ti 

 River, about 40 miles from Surat, 1 have felt convinced that more 

 than one form was lumped under the specific name palmarum. Lately 



