Southern brown bandicoot

Southern brown bandicoot[1]
Foraging adult
Conservation status
Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1)[2]
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Infraclass:	Marsupialia
Order:	Peramelemorphia
Family:	Peramelidae
Genus:	Isoodon
Species:	I. obesulus
Binomial name
Isoodon obesulus (Shaw, 1797)
Subspecies
I. o. obesulus I. o. nauticus
Southern brown bandicoot range

The southern brown bandicoot (Isoodon obesulus) is a short-nosed bandicoot, a type of marsupial, found mostly in southern Australia. It is also known as the quenda in South Western Australia (from the Noongar word kwernt).^[3]

Description

19th-century illustration

The fur of this bandicoot is coarse and coloured a dark greyish to yellowish brown, with the undersides a creamy-white. It has short, round ears.^[3]

The southern brown bandicoot shows some sexual dimorphism, with females being slightly smaller than males. The average male length is 330 mm (13 in), with a tail of 120 mm (4.7 in). Females are about 30 mm (1.2 in) shorter than the male, with a 10 mm (0.39 in) shorter tail. Males weigh an average of 0.9 kg (2.0 lb), females 0.7 kg (1.5 lb).

Juvenile

Life history

Reproduction is closely linked to local rainfall pattern, and many brown bandicoots breed all year around. A litter of up to five young is born after an eleven-day gestation period, and is weaned at two months.^[4]

Conservation status

While some authorities list as many as five subspecies (I. o. fusciventer, I. o. obesulus, I. o. peninsulae, I. o. affinus, I. o. nauticus), the most recent edition of "Mammal Species of the World" only lists I. o. nauticus as a valid subspecies, aside from the nominate; the others are given synonym status.^[1]

In many areas of its range the species is threatened, but it may be locally common where rainfall is high enough and vegetation cover is thick enough. Despite depredations from the introduced European red fox, in some regions it thrives, being reported anecdotally to be living on properties adjoining shopping and population centres such as Stirling in the Adelaide Hills.. It has been reintroduced to some lower rainfall areas where there is protection against cat and fox predation - one such site being Wadderin Sanctuary in the eastern wheatbelt of Western Australia, 300 km east of Perth.

References

1. Groves, C.P. (2005). "Order Peramelemorphia". In Wilson, D.E.; Reeder, D.M. Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3rd ed.). Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 39. ISBN 978-0-8018-8221-0. OCLC 62265494.
2. Friend, T., Morris, K., van Weenen, J., Winter, J. & Menkhorst, P. (2008). Isoodon obesulus. In: IUCN 2008. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Retrieved 28 December 2008. Database entry includes justification for why this species is of least concern
3. "Quenda" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on September 20, 2007. Retrieved 2007-07-23.
4. Whitfield, Philip (1998). The Simon & Schuster Encyclopedia of Animals. New York: Marshall Editions Development Limited. p. 24.