Myospalax aspalax Pallas 1776

Myospalax aspalax Pallas 1776, Reise Prov. Russ. Reichs, Vol. 3: 692.

Type Locality: Russia, Transbaikalia, Dauuria ("Doldogo, on Onon River, below Atchinsk," Ellerman and Morrison-Scott, 1951:652).

Vernacular Names: Steppe Zokor.

Synonyms: Myospalax armandii (Milne-Edwards 1867); Myospalax dybowskii Sherskey 1873; Myospalax hangaicus (Orlov and Baskevich 1992); Myospalax talpinus (Pallas 1811); Myospalax zokor (Desmarest 1822) .

Distribution: Steppes and farmland of Russia on banks of Onon and Ingoda Rivers in the Upper Amur basin, N Mongolia (Sokolov and Orlov, 1980), and NE China (Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning, Nei Mongol, Hebei, and N Shanxi; see Zhang et al., 1997).

Conservation: IUCN - Lower Risk (lc).

Discussion: M. myospalax species group. Listed, with a question mark, as a subspecies of M. myospalax by Ellerman and Morrison-Scott (1951), and unequivocally as M. m. aspalax by Ellerman (1941) and Corbet (1978 c). Separated as a species by Lawrence (1991) based on morphology, a status supported by karyotypic data ( M. myospalax, 2n = 44, FN = 80-84; M. aspalax, 2n = 62, FN =110-114; M. psilurus, 2n = 64, FN =106-108; Martynova, 1975; Nevo, 1999; Vorontsov and Martynova, 1976) and analysis of blood proteins (Martynova et al., 1977). Closest phylogenetic relative is the early Pleistocene M. pseudarmandi, and both belong to the same species group containing the modern M. myospalax and Pliocene M. youngi (Lawrence, 1991) .