L. Forró szerk.: Miscellanea Zoologica Hungarica 7. 1992 (Budapest, 1992)
Topál, Gy.; Csorba, G.: The subspecific division of Rhinolophus luctus Temminck, 1835, and the taxonomic status of R. beddomei Andersen, 1905 (Mammalia, Chiroptera)
Conclusions Though the present study material was limited, in light of the results it still seems reasonable to separate R. beddomei at specific level from the rest of the other subspecies of R. luctus. It has especially small size, relatively shorter lower and upper C-P4 rows, relatively longer upper and lower M1-M3 rows. Furthermore, it has narrower nasal portion, narrow C-C width, reduced width of P 2 . Other cranial and dental features in some cases present probable convergencies with the smaller southern subspecies of R. luctus). Besides, the fact that R. beddomei has the farthest distributional area certainly not connected to those of the other similarily sedentary related forms, all support this assessment. The large gap between the distribution of R. beddomei and that of R. luctus is due to the great distance and the lack of suitable habitats in the Indian Peninsula between the Western Ghats and foothills of the Himalayas. One may suspect besides a probably rather recent connection during the last cool period of the Pleistocene (Mayr 1942) also other contacts and disjunctions between the southwestern and northern areas even during the earlier cool epochs. [There are examples of allopatric species for these areas among birds (e.g. Gallidae, Psittacidae, Capitonidae, Cuculidae, Columbidac, Corvidae and Timaliidae, see Ali 1977, Woodcock 1980) and even mammals (Hemitragus, see Prater 1965) with similar distribution in the Indian Subcontinent]. The various subspecies of R. luctus in many places intergade or at least the existing gaps between their distributions are much smaller. Actually, they show much greater similarities to each other. Acknowledgements We thank the staff members of the National Center for Scientific Research of Vietnam, Hanoi for their help in the field, the Trustees of The Bombay Natural History Society, for access to their collection the staff of the Mammal Collection, The Natural History Museum, for supporting our investigations in the collection in London, and especially Dr. A. Demeter for providing financial support for the visit to London, as well as for his critical comments on the manuscript. Literature Abdulali, H. & Daniel, J.C. (1952): Races of the Indian Giant Squirrel (Ratufa indica). -J. Bombay nat. Hist. Soc. 50: 469-473. Ali, S. (1977): The book of Indian birds. - Bombay Natural History Society, Bombay (10th ed.),175 pp. Allen, G.M. (1928) : New Asiatic mammals. - Amer. Mus. Novitates No. 317: 1-5. Andersen, K. (1905a): On the bats of the Rhinolophus philippinensis group, with descriptions of five new species. - Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. 16 (ser.7): 243-257. Andersen, K. (1905b): A list of the species and subspecies of the genus Rliinolophus, with some notes on their geographical distribution. - Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. 16 (ser.7): 648-662. Andersen, K. (1918): Diagnoses of new bats of the families Rhinolophidae and Megadermatidae. Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. 2 (ser.9): 374-384. Aldo, K, Yasuzumi, F, Tagawa, A. & Uchida, TA. (1983): Further study on the karyotypic evolution in the genus Rliinolophus. - Caryologia 36(2): 101-111. Chasen, F.N. (1940): A handlist of Malaysian mammmals. - Bull. Raffl. Mus. No.15: xx, 209, pp. Chen, Y, Huang, W. & Tang. Z. (1989): (The investigation of Chiroptera in Southern Jiangxi). - Acta Theriol. Sinica 9 (3): 226-227. Corbet, G.B. & Hill, J.E. (1991 ):A World List of Mammalian Species . - Oxford University Press, New York, (3rd ed.) iviii, 243 pp.
