Horváth Géza (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 24. (Budapest 1926)
Éhik, Gy.: Magyarország földipockai
decreasing as we go towards the east. WETTSTEIN, assistant of the Vienna State Museum, who is working with the Austrian Pitymys-es, writes in one of his letters that it is remarkable that the genus hitherto considered to be a West-European, Lusitanian Fauna element as to its occurence, can be found also with us in a rather high number of species. In my reply to his letter I uttered the opinion that the boundary lines of the genus are to be traced much further to the east. If we consider the Hungarian occurrence of the genus, it is striking from what a great number of places it is known. In the possession of actual data we can say with assurance that it inhabits whole Hungary. The only reason why we did not know this fact, is that we did not know the animal. The similar thing happened both in Austria and Germany. That the animal is more familiar in Western-Europe, is due to its greater frequency there. While on those places the Pitymys-es can occur in masses, as pests in favourable weather 1 , a similar multiplication of the genus is never observed with us, not even in the years where they were the most frequent. It was even astonishing that I got comparatively less Pitymys-es last year (in 1924) when voles (Microtus arvalis PALL.) have been very frequent, than in other years. As this fact may be due however to mere chance, I do not want to make conclusions. Habits of the Pitymys. The Pitymys lives according to SÉLYS 2 on wet meadows, vegetable gardens near to rivers. According to BLASIUS 3 it can be found also on fields and mountain pastures. MILLER collected the Pitymys pelandonius in shrubby thickets of Spain 4 . GÉZA ENTZ JUN. caught the Pitymys iranssylvanicus in the Fogaras mountains at an altitude of 2046 meters (about 6100 feet). 5 We can see out of these data that it is possible to talk about the occurrence of the single species of the genus only separately without attempting generalisation. I acquired the majority of Hungarian specimens from territories cultivated with gardening methods, from territories where vegetable gardens, orchards and vineyards alternated with fields. Such 1 There was an invasion of the Capitanata district of the province of Puglia in Italy in 1916 by voles. The most frequent of the invaders was the Pitymys Savii DE SÉLYS. A great number of Arvicola Musignani DE SÉLYS and of Mus sylvaticus intermedius BELLAKY made their appearance too. (MARTELLI, GIOV. : Contribute alia conoscienza della vita e dei costumi delle Arvicole in Puglia. — Boll. Lab. di Zool. Gen. e Agr. Portiéi. XIII, 1919, p. 198.) 2 DE SÉLYS-LONQCHAMFS : Etudes de Micromammalogie. Paris. 1839, p. 104. S BLASIUS: Naturgeschichte derSäugethiereDeutschlands. Braunschweig. 1857, p. 393. 4 MILLER : Catalogue of the Mammals of Western Europe, p. 778. 6 ÉHIK : A new vole from Hungary etc p. 159.
