674 EXTINCT AND VANISHING MAMMALS 



Beira; Baira; Beira Antelope 



DORCATRAGUS MEGALOTis (Menges) 



Oreotragus megalotis Menges, Zool. Anzeiger, vol. 17, no. 444, p. 130, 1894. 

 (Hekebo Plateau, British Somaliland.) 



FIGS.: Sclater and Thomas, 1898, vol. 3, pi. 75, p. 245, fig. 87; Elliot, 1897, 

 pis. 35-36; Bryden, 1899, pi. 10, fig. 8, p. 379, fig. 34; Lydekker, 1908, pi. 10, 

 fig. 8, p. 279, fig. 58; Drake-Brockman, 1910, pi. facing p. 65; Selous, 

 1914, pi. 57; Lydekker and Elaine, 1914, vol. 2, p. 196, fig. 22; Maydon, 

 1932, pi. 64. 



This comparatively rare little antelope is confined to British and 

 French Somaliland and part of Ethiopia and is given partial protec- 

 tion as a Class B species under the London Convention of 1933. 



General color reddish gray; head yellowish red, eyes bordered 

 with whitish ; a dark brown stripe on the flanks ; sides of belly reddish 

 yellow, middle almost white; limbs yellowish red, inner side yellow- 

 ish white to white; hair thick and coarse; ears extraordinarily large. 

 Horns widely separated at base, parallel when viewed from in front, 

 curving slightly forward at tips, and weakly grooved toward base ; 

 females hornless. (Noack, 1894, pp. 202-204.) Height of female at 

 shoulder, 23-26 inches (Sclater and Thomas, 1898, vol. 3, p. 244) . 

 Record length of horns, 5^ inches (Ward, 1935, p. 91) . 



This species was first reported from the Hekebo Plateau, British 

 Somaliland, by Menges in 1885 (p. 455) but was not technically 

 named by him till 1894. Lydekker and Blaine (1914, vol. 2, p. 197) 

 record specimens from the following localities in this country: 

 Adadleh, Waggar Mountains, Sheitch, Sogsodi, Golis Range, and 

 Berbera. De Poncins (in Bryden, 1899, p. 378) "found these ante- 

 lopes about eighty miles inland, in the very steep and desert hills 

 of French Somaliland, and only there." The Ethiopian range is 

 given by Ward (1935, p. 91) as "the upper part of the Blue Nile." 

 Archer (in Archer and Godman, 1937, vol. 1, p. Iviii) refers to the 

 species as "confined to Somaliland and eastern Abyssinia." 



Elliot (1897, p. 135) records two specimens secured from a small 

 band on a peak known as Nasr Hablod, near Hargeisa, British Soma- 

 liland. "Of all the antelope we hunted this species is the most dif- 

 ficult to capture. Their color assimilates so completely with the 

 stony ground they frequent that at a hundred yards, unless the 

 animals are moving or stand on the sky line, it is almost impossible 

 to see them .... This practical impossibility of observing them 

 together with their wonderful speed, accounts for the few that are 

 killed and the rarity of the species in museums." (P. 138.) 



"It is perhaps commoner among the Gadabursi Hills than else- 

 where, but on the hills to the westward of Bulhar, around Tssituggan. 

 on Hegepo and the Dubar Range, and further south on Negegr and 



