Taxonomic Status of Short-Tailed Shrews (Blarina) in Illinois

Molecular Phylogeny of Short-Tailed Shrews, Blarina (Insectivora: Soricidae)

“…4). The distinctive monophyly of each species stands out despite reported instances of hybridization among Blarina species along several contact zones (Genoways and Choate, 1972;Ellis et al, 1978;Tate et al, 1980;French, 1981;Braun and Kennedy, 1983;Qumsiyeh et al, 1997;Benedict, 1999a,b). Even though a relatively dense sampling was done close to the contact zone between B. hylophaga and B. brevicauda in Nebraska, no instance of introgression of mtDNA among species was detected (i.e., heterospecific mtDNA haplotypes were not observed in morphologically defined species).…”

“…Presently, the three species have nearly parapatric distributions ( Fig. 1) and in some cases they are known to hybridize along their contact boundaries (Genoways and Choate, 1972;Ellis et al, 1978;Tate et al, 1980;French, 1981;Braun and Kennedy, 1983;Qumsiyeh et al, 1997;Benedict, 1999a,b).…”

Karyotypic Relationships within the Short-Tailed Shrews, Genus Blarina

“…Ellis et al (1978) studied short-tailed shrews in Illinois and found no mensural overlap of the two taxa. J.…”

Blarina hylophaga (Soricomorpha: Soricidae)

“…B. hylophaga typically is smaller in size than B. brevicauda (northern short-tailed shrew -Davis 1941;Genoways and Choate 1972;Kays and Wilson 2002;Schwartz and Schwartz 2001) and B. shermani (Sherman's short-tailed shrew- Benedict et al 2006), and larger than B. carolinensis (southern short-tailed shrew- Jones et al 1985;Jones and Birney 1988;Jones and Glass 1960;Schmidly and Brown 1979). Several authors have presented the external measurements of the 4 species, but the measurements of B. hylophaga overlap with those of the other 3 species to some extent (Benedict 1999a(Benedict , 1999bBowles 1975;Davis and Schmidly 1994;Ellis et al 1978;Genoways and Choate 1972;Jones et al 1985;Kays and Wilson 2002;Schmidly 2004); therefore, external measurements are not reliable in defining each species. Cranial measurements of B. hylophaga also overlap those of other species in the genus (Benedict 1999a(Benedict , 1999bBenedict et al 2006;Ellis et al 1978;Genoways and Choate 1972;George et al 1981;Jones and Findley 1954;Moncrief et al 1982;Stangl and Carr 1997) and are not a particularly useful tool to distinguish among the 4 species.…”