BY
ROLLIN H. BAKER
AND
JAMES S. FINDLEY
University of Kansas
Lawrence
1953
University of Kansas Publications, Museum of Natural History
Editors: E. Raymond Hall, Chairman, A. Byron Leonard,
Robert W. Wilson
Volume 7, No. 5, pp. 473-477
Published April 21, 1954
University of Kansas
Lawrence, Kansas
PRINTED BY
FERD VOILAND, JR., STATE PRINTER
TOPEKA, KANSAS
1954
BY
ROLLIN H. BAKER and JAMES S. FINDLEY
The University of Kansas Museum of Natural History received from J. R.Alcorn and Albert A. Alcorn a sizable collection of mammals taken in thesummer of 1951 in Alaska. In addition to visiting localities at whichthey had collected in 1947 and 1948 (see Baker, Univ. Kansas Publ., Mus.Nat. Hist., 5:87-117, 1951) the Alcorns obtained specimens fromlocalities not previously visited in the vicinity of Anchorage andHaines and from Sullivan Island, a small, timbered island in the LynnCanal. A part of the funds for field work was made available by theKansas University Endowment Association. The loan of specimens forcomparative study from the Biological Surveys Collection of the UnitedStates National Museum is acknowledged.
Sorex obscurus alascensis Merriam. Dusky Shrew.—Comparison of twospecimens from 7 miles SSE Haines and eight from Sullivan Island (sixfrom the northeast end of the island and two from the southeast end)with topotypes of Sorex obscurus longicauda Merriam from Wrangell,Alaska, and with topotypes of Sorex obscurus alascensis from Yakutat,Alaska, shows that our specimens are intermediate between the two namedkinds. However in nine of ten characters these specimens more closelyresemble S. o. alascensis than S. o. longicauda. Measurements ofspecimens from Wrangell and from localities progressively northwardalong the Alaskan coast reveal a decrease in size of the skull in aclinal fashion. Specimens from Sullivan Island are larger than thosefrom the mainland south of Haines, which are in turn larger thanspecimens from 9 miles W and 4 miles N of Haines (reported upon byBaker, op. cit.). No step is apparent in this cline and assignment ofspecimens must be made on a somewhat arbitrary basis. Specimens fromJuneau, Alaska, in the Biological Surveys Collection of the UnitedStates National Museum, were assigned by Jackson (N. Amer. Fauna, 51:128, 1928) to S. o. alascensis but seem to us to be closer to S. o.longicauda.
Sorex palustris navigator (Baird). Water Shrew.—Two males taken onAugust 5, at Peters Creek, elevation 300 ft., 20 miles NE of Anchorageprovide a northwestern extension of the known[Pg 476] range of this species. Inexternal and cranial characters the males resemble S. p. navigatorfrom 9 miles W and 4 miles N of Haines, Alaska, and from WashingtonCounty, Idaho. The specimens