208 



THE LARGE INDIAN SQUIRREL {SCTUEUS INDICUS, 

 ERX.) AND ITS LOCAL RACES OR SUB-SPECIES. 



By W. T. Blanfokd, F.R.S. 



( With two Plates). 



(Read before the Bombay Natural History Society, on 30th Sept., 1897.) 



As is well known, one of the largest and handsomest of all squirrels 

 inhabits several of the tree forests in the Peninsula of India. Unlike 

 the small striped forms, the large Indian squirrel is by no means 

 generally distributed ; it may have had a more extensive range formerly, 

 and it is probable that its haunts have been gradually restricted by the 

 clearing of the forests and the spread of cultivation, as is the case with so 

 many woodland types of beasts, birds, reptiles, insects, &c. At the 

 present time, the large squirrels appear, so far as I have been able to 

 ascertain, to be only found in the forest tracts near the western coast, in 

 some parts of Southern India, such as Mysore, and in the great wooded 

 reo-ion between the Granges and Godavari, east of longitude 80°E. 

 (the meridian of Jubbulpore). The question of the occurrence of this 

 squirrel beyond the limits of the Indian Peninsula (Cis-Gangetic India) 

 will be noticed in the sequel. 



Until the other day it was generally supposed that the races of Sciurus 

 indicus were pretty well known, and the only question was, whether we 

 should divide these squirrels into three species with Jerdon (Mam. 

 Ind.j pp. 166, 167), or into two with Anderson (Zool. Res., Yunnan Exp., 

 pp. 222, 223), or whether, as proposed by W. Sclater (Cat. Mam. Ind. 

 Mus., Pt. 2, p. 10), we should unite all under one specific heading. The 

 latter view was adopted in my work on Indian Mammals (Faun. 

 Brit. Ind. Mam., p. 371), but I expressed an opinion that Jerdon's 

 three forms were readily recognizable as races or sub-species. One of 

 these races remained nameless, for I shewed that the specific term 

 S. maximus adopted by Jerdon belonged to another race. Some further 

 evidence as to the range of the different races, and the degree to which 

 they pass into each other, is still wanted to complete our information, but 

 it has not for a long time past been supposed that in the case of so con- 

 spicuous and so well-known an Indian mammal any very important 

 addition was likely to be made to its natural history. 



