Species
Aethomys kaiseri
Description
Aethomys kaiseri (Noack, 1887)
The species is widespread on the savanna of eastern Africa. Ongoing genetic work has found two genetically very distinct clades: one is distributed mainly in the Zambezian savanna in Tanzania and Zambia, and the second in the Somali-Masai savanna east of the Rift Valley, from north-eastern Tanzania to southern Ethiopia (Mikula et al., in lit.). Morphological comparison of both clades is necessary and their potential reproductive isolation needs to be studied in the presumed contact zone in the Rift Valley in southwestern Kenya. In Ethiopia, it was reported only recently from two localities in the southernmost part of the country. Three specimens collected at the River Gato, south of Gardula (Bekele & Schlitter 1989) may also represent this species (they were reported as A. hindei by Yalden et al. 1996; see the map and account of this species). On the other hand, the GBIF record from Godare in western Ethiopia is questionable. It is based on a series of seven specimens of Aethomys in BMNH from this locality; six were identified as A. hindei and one as A. kaiseri, but the two species are not known to overlap anywhere in their distribution. All Aethomys collected by Lavrenchenko and colleagues in the Godare forest were A. hindei.
Taxonomy
Aethomys kaiseri is a species. It belogs to the Muridae family.
