48 Joshua Laerm, C. H. Wharton, and W. M. Ford 



(Betula luted), black birch (B. lenta), liden {J ilia heterophylla), and 

 hemlock (Tsuga canadensis), with a rhododendron (Rhododendron 

 maximum) understory. 



The mammalian fauna of Burnt Cabin Branch has marked boreal 

 affinities. Wharton (1968) reported the first Georgia records of the 

 masked shrew (Sorex cinereus) and pygmy shrew (S. hoyi) from Beech 

 Creek, another tributary of the Tallulah River within 500 m of the 

 present locality, and Laerm (1992) reported the first Georgia record 

 of the hairy-tailed mole (Parascalops brewerii) from the present locality. 

 Other small mammals recovered in pitfalls and snap traps at Burnt 

 Cabin Branch include Sorex cinereus, S. fumeus, Blarina brevicauda, 

 Tamiasciurus hudsonicus, Peromyscus maniculatus, Napaeozapus 

 insignis, and Clethrionomys gapperi. 



Sorex palustris is distributed in the transcontinental Canadian 

 boreal forest from Nova Scotia westward to southeastern Alaska and 

 southward throughout much of the Sierra Nevada and Rocky 

 Mountains in the western United States as well as the Appalachian 

 Mountains to Tennessee, North Carolina (Hall 1981, Beneski and 

 Stinson 1987), and now Georgia in the eastern United States. Populations 

 throughout the Appalachian Mountains from southwestern Pennsylvania 

 to Georgia are referable to S. palustris punctulatus Hooper 1942, the 

 West Virginia water shrew. Based on available published sources, 

 museum records, and personal communications it appears that S. p. 

 punctulatus is rare and its distribution characterized by a series of 

 apparently disjunct populations. 



The northernmost record for S. p. punctulatus is a single specimen 

 from Cove Run in the Negro Mountains, Somerset County, Pennsyl- 

 vania (Doutt et al. 1966, Enders 1985). More recently, two additional 

 specimens have been obtained from Somerset County (C. Bier and 

 S. McLaren, personal communication; specimens in Carnegie Museum 

 of Natural History). Apparently, the distribution of this subspecies is 

 disjunct from that of S. p. albibarbis which is reported from central 

 and northeastern Pennsylvania and northward (Hall 1981, Beneski 

 and Stinson 1987, Merritt 1987). 



Mansuetti (1958), Paradiso (1969), and Feldhamer et al. (1984) 

 discussed the questionable occurrence of S. palustris in Maryland. 

 However, seven individuals of S. p. punctulatus are now known from 

 seven sites in Maryland, all from Garrett County (E. Thompson, 

 Maryland Natural Heritage Program, personal communication). At least 

 12 individuals are known from five counties (Pendleton, Pocahantas, 

 Preston, Randolph, and Tucker) in West Virginia (Kellogg 1937, 

 Hooper 1942, McKeever 1952, and records on file with West Virginia 



