Studies on the Small Mammal Fauna of Sabah, East Malaysia I. Order Chiroptera and Genus Tupaia (Primates)

Abstract

Tree-shrews, Tupaia montana, T. tana and twenty-four species of Chiroptera are studied in this paper. Among twenty-four bat species, Cynopterus horsfieldi is new to Sabah, while two bats, Myotis siligorensis and Miniopterus magnater are the first to be reported from Borneo Island. The last species, Miniopterus magnater was formerly treated as a subspecies of M. schreibersi, but the authors have come to the conclusion by the present re-examination that this animal is not schreibersi but a different form which has never been described as a species. As they show good specific characters, the present authors have shifted its taxon to the species rank. Some ecological data for these species which were recorded in three major caves on the east coast are also given. Some statistical analyses are tried for the population of Tupaia montana, and the results are compared with the ecological data.