The Carpentarian dunnart (''Sminthopsis butleri'') also known as Butler's dunnart is a
marsupial
Marsupials are a diverse group of mammals belonging to the infraclass Marsupialia. They are natively found in Australasia, Wallacea, and the Americas. One of marsupials' unique features is their reproductive strategy: the young are born in a r ...
with a puffy brown or mouse grey colour above and the underside of white, similar to its close relative the
Kakadu dunnart. Head to anus length is 75-88mm with a tail of 72-90mm long for a total length of 147-178mm. Weight varies from 10-20g depending on a variety of factors including sex, food abundance, habitat etc.
Distribution and habitat
Found in the Northern
Kimberley
Kimberly or Kimberley may refer to:
Places and historical events
Australia
Queensland
* Kimberley, Queensland, a coastal locality in the Shire of Douglas
South Australia
* County of Kimberley, a cadastral unit in South Australia
Ta ...
's near
Kalumburu in
Western Australia
Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...
and
Bathurst and
Melville Island in the
Northern Territory
The Northern Territory (abbreviated as NT; known formally as the Northern Territory of Australia and informally as the Territory) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian internal territory in the central and central-northern regi ...
. Habitat consists of
eucalyptus
''Eucalyptus'' () is a genus of more than 700 species of flowering plants in the family Myrtaceae. Most species of ''Eucalyptus'' are trees, often Mallee (habit), mallees, and a few are shrubs. Along with several other genera in the tribe Eucalyp ...
and
melaleuca
''Melaleuca'' () is a genus of nearly 300 species of plants in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae, commonly known as paperbarks, honey-myrtles, bottlebrushes or tea-trees (although the last name is also applied to species of '' Leptospermum''). They ...
forest with sandy soils up to and including from the coast.
Social organisation and breeding
May breed in the dry season but needs more study.
Diet
No information, but most likely insects and small vertebrates.
References
Further reading
*
*
External links
Australian Biological Resources StudyAustralianfauna.com
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20050719131018/http://www.deh.gov.au/biodiversity/threatened/publications/recovery/p-mimulus-s-butleri-n-aquilo/pubs/p-mimulus-s-butleri-n-aquilo.pdf#search='Carpentarian%20Dunnart' Recovery plan]
Threatened species of the Northern Territory
{{Taxonbar, from=Q134084
Dasyuromorphs
Mammals of Western Australia
Mammals of the Northern Territory
Marsupials of Australia
Mammals described in 1979
Taxa named by Mike Archer (paleontologist)