Whitish Dwarf Squirrel

About this species

Range

Sulawesi, Buton, Muna, Kabaena and adjacent southeastern islands

The whitish dwarf squirrel is one of the small endemic squirrels of Sulawesi and its satellite islands. Its verified range includes Sulawesi, Buton, Muna, Kabaena and adjacent islands to the southeast. A systematic review places Prosciurillus leucomus in a species group with P. alstoni and P. topapuensis. Members of Prosciurillus are generally brownish or olive, often with coloured ear tufts and tail banding; P. leucomus is additionally marked by contrasting colour patches along the nape (Musser et al. 2010; Wikipedia general account).

Genomic research on Sulawesi squirrels found that most recognised Prosciurillus species, including the whitish dwarf squirrel, have restricted distributions. The work used museum specimens to reconstruct their evolutionary history and confirmed that the island’s dwarf squirrels form a diverse endemic radiation rather than a single widespread form. The sources opened did not contain species-specific diet, breeding or activity data for P. leucomus, so those traits are not borrowed from other squirrels despite their close relationship (Zelditch et al. 2016; Musser et al. 2010).

Description: Wildlife of sulawesi guide, Wildlife of Everywhere (wildlifeofeverywhere.com); general species information paraphrased from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)