Bavarian Pine Vole

Bavarian pine vole
Conservation status
Critically Endangered (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Rodentia
Family:	Cricetidae
Genus:	Microtus
Subgenus:	Terricola
Species:	M. bavaricus
Binomial name
Microtus bavaricus (König, 1962)

The Bavarian pine vole (Microtus bavaricus) is a vole from the Austrian, Italian, and Bavarian Alps of Europe. It lived in moist meadows at elevations of 600-1,000 metres. There are 23 museum specimens of this species.

This rodent was previously known from only one location in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Bavaria, Germany, which has since been altered by the construction of a hospital in the 1980s. No specimens of this rodent were recorded after 1962 and it was thought to be extinct. However, a population apparently belonging to this species was discovered in 2000 in Northern Tyrol, just across the German-Austrian border. An Austrian scientist, Friederike Spitzenberger, stumbled upon the species in one of her "live traps". Its species status has been confirmed by genetic studies, and it is very closely related to Liechtenstein's vole (Microtus liechtensteini) from the Eastern Alps (Martinkova et al., 2007). Further research is required to determine the size and range of the population and the species has been re-assessed as Critically Endangered by the IUCN.

See also

• Lazarus taxon

References

• Spitzenberger, F., Zima, J., Meinig, H. & Vohralík, V. (2008). Microtus bavaricus. In: IUCN 2008. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Downloaded on 12 May 2006. Database entry includes justification for why this species is listed as critically endangered.
• 'A Gap in Nature' by Tim Flannery and Peter Schouten (2001), published by William Heinemann
• Martinkova, N., J. Zima, M. Jaarola, M. Macholan and F. Spitzenberger,F. 2007. The origin and phylogenetic relationships of Microtus bavaricus based on karyotype and mitochondrial DNA sequences. Folia Zool. Brno: 56, 39-49.
• Musser, G. G. and M. D. Carleton. 2005. Superfamily Muroidea. Pp. 894-1531 in Mammal Species of the World a Taxonomic and Geographic Reference. D. E. Wilson and D. M. Reeder eds. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore.
• The Extinction Website, published by Peter Maas
• IUCN Red List of Threatened Species: Microtus bavaricus, published by Peter Maas