''Myoictis'' or striped dasyure is a genus of
marsupial
Marsupials are any members of the mammalian infraclass Marsupialia. All extant marsupials are endemic to Australasia, Wallacea and the Americas. A distinctive characteristic common to most of these species is that the young are carried in a ...
s in the order
Dasyuromorphia
Dasyuromorphia (, meaning "hairy tail" in Greek) is an order comprising most of the Australian carnivorous marsupials, including quolls, dunnarts, the numbat, the Tasmanian devil, and the thylacine. In Australia, the exceptions include the omn ...
. It is found in
New Guinea
New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; id, Papua, or , historically ) is the world's second-largest island with an area of . Located in Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is separated from Australia by the wide Torr ...
.
There are four species:
*
Woolley's three-striped dasyure, ''Myoictis leucura''
*
Three-striped dasyure
The three-striped dasyure (''Myoictis melas'') is a member of the order Dasyuromorphia. This marsupial carnivore lives in West Papua and Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini) ...
, ''Myoictis melas''
*
Wallace's dasyure, ''Myoictis wallacii''
*
Tate's three-striped dasyure
The Tate's three-striped dasyure (''Myoictis wavicus'') is a member of the order Dasyuromorphia. This marsupial carnivore lives in New Guinea
New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; id, Papua, or , historically ) is the world's second- ...
, ''Myoictis wavicus''
The taxonomy for the species was difficult for most biologist to understand. Woolley proposed the names the four different species by recognizing the animal by the morphological differences. While also using genetic testing, scientist have found that ''
Myoictis melas'' and ''
Myoictis wallacei'' contain a sequence divergence of 12.85%.
Each of the four species were found to have significant physical differences between them. ''
Myoictis wavicus'' averages roughly 122 grams, ''
Myoictis wallacei'' averages roughly 230 grams, ''
Myoictis leucura'' averages roughly 220 grams, and ''
Myoictis melas'' averages roughly 220 grams. The proportions of head and limb size were also found to be smaller with the smaller mass.
''
Myoictis leucura'', or Woolley's Three-striped Dasyure was recently described being genetically and morphologically distinct from the other members of the genus ''Myoictis''. It is more similar to the ''M. wavicus''.
Between 1894 and 1895, ''
Myoictis leucura'' was found in Papua New Guinea, the southern side of the Central Cordillera. It normally lives in elevations between 650 meters and 1600 meters. The species inhabits mostly lowland and montane forest. Peter Dwyer has found the species to be active during the daytime and being mostly terrestrial.
References
Woolley, P. 2008. Myoictis leucura. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2008: e.T136449A4293240. .
Woolley, P. 2005. Revision of the Three-striped dasyures, genus myoictis (marsupialia: dasyuridae), of New Guinea, with description of a new species.
Donnellan, S., Krajewski, C., Westerman, M., Woolley, P., Young, J., 2006. Molecular Relationships of New Guinean three-striped dasyures, (Myoictis, Marsupialia: Dasyuridae)
Dasyuromorphs
Marsupial genera
Taxa named by John Edward Gray
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