The brown-tailed mongoose, brown-tailed vontsira, Malagasy brown-tailed mongoose, or salano (''Salanoia concolor'') is a species of

mammal Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur ...

in the family

Eupleridae Eupleridae is a family of carnivorans endemic to Madagascar and comprising 10 known living species in seven genera, commonly known as euplerids, Malagasy mongooses or Malagasy carnivorans. The best known species is the fossa (''Cryptoproct ...

. It is endemic to Madagascar. Its natural

habitat In ecology, the term habitat summarises the array of resources, physical and biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species habitat can be seen as the physical ...

is moist lowland tropical forest. It is threatened by

habitat loss Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...

Taxonomy

The brown-tailed mongoose was first described in 1837 by French zoologist Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire under the names ''Galidia unicolor'' and ''Galidia olivacea''. He placed both in the

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

''Galidia'', together with the

ring-tailed mongoose The ring-tailed vontsira, locally still known as the ring-tailed mongoose (''Galidia elegans'') is a euplerid in the subfamily Galidiinae, a carnivoran native to Madagascar. It is the only species in genus ''Galidia''. Classification and et ...

(''Galidia elegans''), which is now recognized as the only species of that genus. However, the name ''unicolor'' had been a misprint for ''concolor'', and the name was corrected in an erratum and in a later note by Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire. In 1865,

John Edward Gray John Edward Gray, FRS (12 February 1800 – 7 March 1875) was a British zoologist. He was the elder brother of zoologist George Robert Gray and son of the pharmacologist and botanist Samuel Frederick Gray (1766–1828). The same is used f ...

placed ''concolor'' and ''olivacea'' in their own

subgenus In biology, a subgenus (plural: subgenera) is a taxonomic rank directly below genus. In the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, a subgeneric name can be used independently or included in a species name, in parentheses, placed between ...

of ''Galidia'', which he called ''

Salanoia ''Salanoia'' is a genus of euplerid carnivoran with two currently described species found in Madagascar. They are mongoose-like, which is reflected in the older versions of their English names, for example brown-tailed mongoose which is now calle ...

''. In 1882, St. George Jackson Mivart also separated ''olivacea'' and ''concolor'' from ''Galidia'', and placed them in a separate genus ''Hemigalidia'', without mentioning ''Salanoia''. In his 1904 ''Index generum mammalium'', Palmer noted that ''Salanoia'', the first name to be published, was the proper name for the genus. Although

Glover Morrill Allen Glover Morrill Allen (February 8, 1879 – February 14, 1942) was an American zoologist. He was born at Walpole, New Hampshire, the son of Reverend Nathaniel Glover Allen and Harriet Ann (Schouler) Allen, and studied at Harvard University. While s ...

, in 1939, still listed two species, which he called ''Salanoia olivacea'' and ''S. unicolor'', by 1972 R. Albignac recognized a single species only, which he called ''Salanoia concolor''. A second species of ''Salanoia'', ''

Salanoia durrelli Durrell's vontsira (''Salanoia durrelli'') is a small, reddish-brown, fox-like mammal native to the island of Madagascar. Discovered in 2004, it lives only in the biodiverse wetlands of Lake Alaotra. Durrell's vontsira belongs to the family Euple ...

'', was described in 2010.Durbin et al., 2010

Notes

References

Literature cited

*Albignac, R. 1972. The Carnivora of Madagascar. Pp. 667–682 in Battistini, R. & Richard-Vindard, G. (eds.). Biogeography and Ecology in Madagascar. The Hague: W. Junk B.B., Publishers. *Allen, G.M. 1939. A checklist of African mammals. Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard College 83:1–763. * *Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, I. 1837
Notice sur deux nouveaux genres de Mammifères carnassiers, les ''Ichneumies'', du continent africain, et les ''Galidies'', de Madagascar
Comptes rendus hebdomadaires des séances de l'Académie des sciences 5:578–582 (in French)
Errata
*Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, I. 1839
Notice sur deux nouveaux genres de mammifères carnassiers, les ''Ichneumies'', du continent African, et les ''Galidies'', de Madagascar
Magasin de Zoologie (2)1:1–39. *Gray, J.E. 1865
A revision of the genera and species of viverrine animals (Viverridae) founded on the collection in the British Museum
Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 1864:502–579. * *Mivart, St.G. 1882
On the classification and distribution of the Aeluroidea
Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 1882:135–208. *Palmer, T. 1904
Index generum mammalium: a list of the genera and families of mammals
North American Fauna 23:1–984. *Wozencraft, W.C. 2005. Order Carnivora. Pp. 532–628 in Wilson, D.E. & Reeder, D.M. (eds.). Mammal Species of the World: a taxonomic and geographic reference. 3rd ed. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2 vols., 2142 pp. {{Taxonbar, from=Q790653 Euplerids Mongoose, brown-tailed Mammals of Madagascar Endemic fauna of Madagascar Fauna of the Madagascar lowland forests Vulnerable animals Vulnerable biota of Africa Mammals described in 1837 Taxa named by Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire Taxonomy articles created by Polbot