The white-legged duiker (''Cephalophus crusalbum'') is a medium-sized antelope species from the subfamily of duikers (''Cephalophinae'') within the family of

bovid The Bovidae comprise the biological family of cloven-hoofed, ruminant mammals that includes cattle, bison, buffalo, antelopes, and caprines. A member of this family is called a bovid. With 143 extant species and 300 known extinct species, t ...

s (Bovidae). It is native to

Gabon Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the nort ...

and the

Republic of the Congo The Republic of the Congo (french: République du Congo, ln, Republíki ya Kongó), also known as Congo-Brazzaville, the Congo Republic or simply either Congo or the Congo, is a country located in the western coast of Central Africa to the w ...

. It was described as subspecies of the

Ogilby's duiker Ogilby's duiker (''Cephalophus ogilbyi'') is a small antelope found in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ghana, southeastern Nigeria, Bioko Island and possibly Gabon. No subspecies are recognized. The two former subspecies, the white-legged duiker ''Ceph ...

(''Cephalophus ogilbyi'') by Peter Grubb in 1978. After a revision of the ungulates in 2011 by Colin Groves, it is now regarded as distinct species.

Description

The head-body length is usually , but two collected specimens had lengths of 145 cm. The tail length is between 13 and 16 cm and the weight is about . The coat is golden brown. The hindquarters and the rump are darker than the flanks. The neck, the forequarters and the belly are grey. A black broad dorsal stripe is 2.5 to 6.0 cm in width. It runs from the shoulders to the rump, where it narrowed to 1 cm and extended to the tail tip. Aside from the black middle stripe, the upperside of the tail is golden brown. The underside of the tail has distinctly longer white hairs, and the end of the tail consists of a small tuft of about 7.5-cm-long golden brown hairs. All four legs are relatively long, with distinct white hairs below the carpus and the tarsus. The throat and the lower jaw are white. The head is grey with a darker brown forehead and a black muzzle. A bright chestnut-coloured arch runs over both eyes. The coronal tufts between the eyes are dark chestnut-coloured. The ears have sparse black hairs on the outer sides. On the surface of the innerside of the ears are distinct white hairs. Both sexes have horns; lengths of 8.7 to 10.9 cm were measured for the males, and about 5 cm for the females. The dental formula is I 0/3-C 0/1-P 3/3-M 3/3 (× 2) = 32 in total.Groves & Leslie, Jr., 2011:p. 765

Footnotes

References

*Peter Grubb: ''A new antelope from Gabon'' In: Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. Volume 62, Issue 4, April 1978 *C. P. Groves & D. M. Leslie, Jr.: ''Family Bovidae (Hollow-horned Ruminants)''. In: Wilson, D. E., Mittermeier, R. A. (edts.). Handbook of the Mammals of the World. Volume 2: Hooved Mammals. Lynx Edicions, 2011. *Colin Peter Groves & Peter Grubb: ''Ungulate Taxonomy'', Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011. white-legged duiker Mammals of Gabon Mammals of the Republic of the Congo white-legged duiker Taxobox binomials not recognized by IUCN {{eventoedungulate-stub