Bronze Quoll

Taxobox
name = Bronze QuollMSW3 Groves|pages=25]
status = NT
trend = down
status_system = iucn3.1
status_ref = IUCN2006 | assessors = Australasian Marsupial & Monotreme Specialist Group | year = 1996 | id = 6301 | title = Dasyurus spartacus | downloaded = 2007-02-02]


regnum = Animalia
phylum = Chordata
classis = Mammalia
infraclassis = Marsupialia
ordo = Dasyuromorphia
familia = Dasyuridae
genus = "Dasyurus"
species = "D. spartacus"
binomial = "Dasyurus spartacus"
binomial_authority = Van Dyck, 1987

The Bronze Quoll ("Dasyurus spartacus") is a species of quoll found only in New Guinea. It was discovered in the early 1970s when five specimens were collected, but only described in 1987 when Dr. Stephen Van Dyck of the Queensland Museum examined them and recognised their distinctness. [cite book|authorlink=Karl Shuker|last=Shuker|first=Karl|title=The Lost Ark: New and Rediscovered Animals of the 20th Century|publisher=HarperCollins Publishers|year=1993|pages=91|isbn=0-00-219943-2]

Very little is known of it; it was previously thought to be an outlying population of the Western Quoll ("Dasyurus geoffroii"). [cite web|last=Firestone|first=Karen|title=Population genetics of New Guinean quolls|publisher=University of New South Wales|url=http://www.bees.unsw.edu.au/school/staff/firestone/firestoneprojects.html#7|accessdate=2007-02-02]

References