ORDER MARSUPIALIA: MARSUPIALS 45 



/ 



mate doom of the terrestrial and non-burrowing highly specialized 

 creature. . . . Myrmecobius may be regarded as one of the marsu- 

 pials within sight of extermination, in this instance not due to 

 exploitation by man, but as the result of settlement and introduced 

 enemies. Hope for ultimate survival may rest with the introduction 

 of a healthy colony to an island providing adequate supplies of 

 favoured diet, and absence of enemies." (E. Le G. Troughton, 

 in Hit., April 16, 1937.) 



Its "very existence ... is threatened by both fox and cat" 

 (Troughton, 1938, p. 404) . 



South Australian Numbat; Rusty Numbat 



MYRMECOBIUS FASCIATUS RUFUS Jones 



Myrmecobius rujus Jones, Mammals S. Australia, pt. 1, p. 123, figs. 79, 83, and 



84, 1923. ("South Australia.") 

 FIG. : Jones, 1923, fig. 79. 



This form of Numbat, apparently extinct in New South Wales 

 and coastal South Australia, still lingers in northwestern South 

 Australia and in southwestern Central Australia. 



It differs from the West Australian Numbat in having the darker 

 part of the lower back "a fine bright brown" instead of blackish; tail 

 "a uniform grizzle of rust red and dark brown." Head and body, 

 175 mm.; tail, 135 mm. (Jones, 1923, pp. 124-126.) Finlayson 

 states (1933c, p. 204) that the outer surface of the ear is bright 

 rufous instead of yellow and black, and he gives the following 

 measurements for specimens from northwestern South Australia: 

 head and body, 200-270 mm.; tail, 130-170 mm. 



"The New South Wales animal, reported fairly plentiful about 

 the plains of the Murray and Darling Rivers in 1862, ... is 

 apparently extinct" (E. Le G. Troughton, in litt., April 16, 1937). 



It is perhaps the present form to which Helms refers (1896, 

 p. 255) in reporting the observations of the Elder Expedition 

 somewhere in South or Western Australia: "A more exciting piece 

 of work [by the natives] than digging for lizards is the excavating 

 for the quick, little, banded anteater, Myrmecobius jasciatus, which 

 animal often makes its lair over three feet below the surface." 

 This expedition brought back a dried skin from the Everard Range, 

 South Australia (Stirling and Zietz, 1893, p. 154) . 



Jones (1923, pp. 126-127) says of this Numbat: 



The Numbat was probably never a very abundant animal, but its distribu- 

 tion was comparatively wide. Only twenty years ago it was met with along 

 the scrub lands of the Murray, and earlier than that it existed quite near to 

 Adelaide. Enquiries as to its present existence have produced negative replies 

 from all those parts of the State in which there are schools, and the circulation 



