ORDER PERISSODACTYLA : ODD-TOED UNGULATES 359 



much prized by the Turkomans, and in winter was commonly sold 

 at the bazaar in Yolatan. 



Matschie (1911, p. 23), besides recording the type of finschi from 

 northeast of Zaisan Nor, mentions another specimen from the 

 Maiterek Steppe north of this lake. 



J. H. Miller (in Carruthers, 1913, p. 608) states that the animals 

 " extend throughout Northern Russian Turkestan, being exceedingly 

 numerous in the neighbourhood of Lake Balkash." It is doubtful, 

 however, if this statement was appropriate as late as 1913. 



Schwarz (1929, p. 91) mentions a specimen from the vicinity of 

 Merv that formerly lived in the Berlin Zoological Garden. He gives 

 the range of this form as extending from the northern border of the 

 Persian Plateau through West Turkestan and the Kirghiz Steppe to 

 the western slope of the Altai. 



Nazaroff (1932, p. 54) refers to the species as extinct in the Tash- 

 kent region. 



According to W. G. Heptner (in litt., December, 1936) , the Kulan 

 is now a rare animal with a small distribution in the U. S. S. R. 

 At the beginning of the nineteenth century it occupied the plains of 

 Turkestan and almost all the steppes of Kazakstan. It is now met 

 with in Turkmenia (principally west of the Murghab) , and persists 

 in small numbers in the desert steppes near Lake Balkash. Hunting 

 is absolutely forbidden, and reserves are being organized. 



"Today there are only a few scattered troops, in yearly diminished 

 numbers, near the Oasis of Merw and the Afghanistan frontier the 

 last remnants of the immense herds which roamed the steppes of 

 Asiatic Russia 100 years ago" (Antonius, 1938, p. 559) . 



North Persian Wild Ass; Persian Onager; Ghor-khar 



ASINUS HEMIONUS ONAGER (Boddaert) 



[Equus] Onager Boddaert, Elenchus Animalium, p. 160, (1784) 1785. (Based 

 upon the "Onager" of Pallas, Neue Nord. Beytrage, vol. 2, p. 22, pi. 2, 

 1781; type locality erroneously stated as "in desertis Argunis"; corrected 

 by Harper (1940, p. 199) to "mountains about Kasbin, " northwestern 

 Persia.) 



FIGS.: Pallas, 1780, pis. 11-12; Pallas, 1781, pi. 2; Pallas, Zoographia Rosso- 

 Asiatica, pi. to vol. 1, p. 264, 1834-42; Hamilton Smith, 1841, pi. 18; 

 Lydekker, 1904, pi. 19; Kennion, 1911, pi. facing p. 121; Brehm's Tier- 

 leben (IV), 12, p. 674, tab. Unpaarhufer V, fig. 3, 1915; Antonius, 1939, 

 figs. 2-3. 



The present numerical status of the North Persian Wild Ass, 

 like that of various other mammals of that country, is a matter on 

 which up-to-date information is difficult to acquire. It is probably 

 quite scarce; at least it very seldom affords a glimpse of itself to 

 the scientific traveler. The Wild Ass of Afghanistan is provisionally 

 referred to the present subspecies. 



