Afghanistan Habitat: Hedgehogs, found from the lowest elevation to 3,000 m. in Afghanistan, were not seen in Wakhan, Badakshan, or in Monsoonal Afghanistan. They were collected in oases as frequently as in the steppes and semideserts, evidently frequenting the clay and loess biotope more than any other.Taxonomic Notes and Discussion. -Is Hemiechinus megalotis a good species or a subspecies of H. auritusi Blyth (1845, p. 353) notes: "the Siberian E. auritus is described, in Pennant's Quadrupeds, to have the 'upper jaw long and slender;with very large open ears, naked, brown round the edges, with soft whitish hairs within; tail shorter than that of the European Hedgehog: upper part of the body covered with slender brown spines, encompassed at the base, and near the ends, with a ring of white: the belly and limbs clothed in a most elegant soft white fur.' The statements here italicized do not apply to the great-eared Afghan Hedgehog ..." According to Ellerman and Morrison-Scott (1951, p. 24) : "The British Museum material gives the following cranial measurements for H. megalotis, length of skull 52-56.9 mm. (average 54 mm, [sic] two specimens) . . . Our specimens of megalotis are from Kandahar and Baluchistan." They contend that H. auritus is a smaller hedgehog albeit: "Ognev's form major can have the skull as large as in megalotis." Siddiqui (1961, p. 94), studying five megalotis from Baluchistan, distinguishes megalotis as having the longest spine not less than 25 mm. while the longest spine on H. auritus was not more than 20 mm. Niethammer (1965, p. 21) mentions that H. megalotis "... resembles H. auritus, but is larger. Its color varies in Afghanistan from nearly white to nearly black." He concludes that: "The measurements of both species will probably prove to overlap when more material becomes available." Niethammer (1969, pp. 257-274), reporting on additional specimens, shows ". . . that if the criteria given in the literature (size, length of spines, number of light and dark bars on the spines, and color of the ventral side) are considered.