''Bibimys'' is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

of new world rats. Commonly known as the crimson-nosed rats, there are three species: *'' Bibimys chacoensis'' - Chaco crimson-nosed rat - found in north-east

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

and

Paraguay Paraguay (; ), officially the Republic of Paraguay ( es, República del Paraguay, links=no; gn, Tavakuairetã Paraguái, links=si), is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to th ...

*'' Bibimys labiosus'' - Large-lipped crimson-nosed rat - south-east

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

*'' Bibimys torresi'' - Torres's crimson-nosed rat - central

A extinct species '' Bibimys massoiai'' is known from Quaternary remains in northeastern Brazil. Presently, species of ''Bibimys'' are found in Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay. As with most of the species in the South American Sigmodontinae, ''Bibimys'' has been arranged as a genus based mainly on morphological differences from the other living genera. ''Bibimys'' belongs to the tribe Scapteromyini, first informally described by P. Hershkovitz in 1966 and formally introduced later by E. Massoia in 1979. The scapteromyines are a small sigmodotine tribe, consisting of the three genera: ''Bibimys'', ''Kunsia'' and ''Scapteromys''. Many of the species have been described from badly preserved specimens. One of the greatest challenges lying with sigmodontine systematics is that there is much confusion and disagreement amongst authors regarding the relationship between their tribes. There are some disagreements regarding the validity of the scapteromyines and of ''Bibimys'' as a genus. In a broad phylogenetic study, Smith and Patton found that the scapteromyine genera ''Kunsia'' and ''Scapteromys'' formed a clade closely related to the Akodontini.Smith, M.F. and J.L. Patton,
Phylogenetic relationship and the radiation of sigmodontinae rodents in South America: Evidence from cytochrome b
''Journal of Mammalian Evolution'' 6: 89-128 (1999) In another study, D´Elia, Pardiñas and Myers have provisionally retained three species of ''Bibimys''. Given the inadequacies of sample size and geographic representation, however, they acknowledged that morphological, karyotypic, and genetic evidence for their separation is unpersuasive.

References

Sources

* * Hershkovitz, P. "South American swamp and fossorial rats of the scapteromyine group (Cricetinae, Muridae) with comments to the glans penis in murid taxonomy. ''Zeitschrift für Saugetierkunde'' 31: 81-149. (1966) * Massoia, E. "Descripción de un género y especie nuevos: ''Bibimys torresi'' (Mammalia-Rodentia-Cricetidae-Sigmodontinae-Scapteromyni) ''Physis'', C38: 1-7 (1979) {{Taxonbar, from=Q679129 Rodent genera