Diagnosis.—Size of body medium; color of upper parts Cinnamon Brown; skull with occiput strongly inclined anterodorsally in males.
Fig. 2 Three views of the skull of the type specimen of Geomys bursarius industrius.
A. Lateral view;
B. Dorsal view;
C. Ventral view.
Description.—Color: Upper parts Cinnamon Brown, slightly reddish, but in some specimens collected in September, in Pawnee County, near (15´ i) Ochraceous-Tawny; underparts usually Wood Brown, somewhat whitish anteriorly; forefeet white; hind feet and approximately distal half of tail whitish. Size: Medium (see measurements), total length averaging not more than 271 mm. in males and 254 in females; hind foot averaging not more than 35 mm. in males and less than 32 in females. Skull: In males, least width of braincase equal to distance from alveolus of incisor to anterior border of alveolus of first upper molar, occiput strongly inclined anterodorsally, temporal impressions usually united in a low sagittal crest, zygomatic arch heavy and curved at level of jugal bone. In adult females least width of braincase approximately equal to distance from alveolus of incisor to anterior border of alveolus of first upper molar (not premolar); occiput less inclined anterodorsally than in males; temporal ridges not forming a sagittal crest. In young females the width of the braincase is more than the distance between the alveoli of the incisor and first molar.
Comparisons.—G. lutescens industrius differs from G. lutescens lutescens in: Color darker; least width of braincase not equal to (usually more than) the distance from the alveolus of incisor to the anterior border of the alveolus of the first upper molar.
G. lutescens industrius differs from G. lutescens jugossicularis in: Color slightly darker, the former being Cinnamon Brown instead of Vinaceous Cinnamon, with hairs basally Deep Neutral Gray in upper parts and underparts. Skull: Jugular part of zygomatic arch more curved (convex dorsally) and occiput far more inclined anterodorsally; lower part of mastoidal ridge more prominent.
For comparison with G. l. major, see account of that subspecies.
Remarks.—Judging from the known specimens of this subspecies, it has the smallest geographic range of any of the subspecies in Kansas, but additional collecting in Hodgeman County and counties to the north and west of it may extend the known range in those directions; collecting in Comanche County and in adjoining parts of Oklahoma may extend the known range to the southward.
The anterodorsal inclination of the occiput in males is the one cranial character in which industrius differs from all of the subspecies with adjoining geographic ranges. The existence of this unique (among adjoining subspecies) cranial character is the principal reason for according subspecific status to this animal. Although it has other characters which are fairly uniform over a considerable geographic area, these other characters, namely, Cinnamon Brown color of the upper parts and medium size of the body, after all, are conditions intermediate between those in jugossicularis to the west and those in the darker and larger animals assigned to major to the eastward. Considering the intermediate geographic position of industrius, the color and size are approximately what a person would predict by study of only the animals to the west and those to the east. Therefore, the color and size probably are indicative of intergradation between jugossicularis and major. Still, there is the anterodorsally inclined occiput in males—a character of a unique sort—and this influences us to give subspecific status to this animal with full recognition of the fact that it is a "weak" subspecies as compared with any one of the adjoining subspecies.
Hooper (1940:2) in naming as new Geomys lutescens jugossicularis referred to his new subspecies a skin-only from Meade County State Park. Our more abundant material from there shows the cranial conformation to be that of industrius to which we accordingly assign the specimens. However, with only a skin available, we, too, would have used the name jugossicularis because the color is paler than in other specimens of industrius and this paleness indicates intergradation between the two named subspecies. Specimens from Pratt County are slightly darker than industrius thereby indicating intergradation between industrius and major.