Characters.—Skull short (♂ 54.6, ♀ 52.3); narrow across mastoid processes; tail long; body short.
Mephitis macroura eximius new subspecies
Type.—Female, adult, skin with skull, No. 19272, Mus. Nat. Hist., Univ. Kansas; 15 kilometers west of Piedras Negras, 300 feet elevation, Veracruz, Mexico; 13 January 1947; obtained by J. Mazza and Walter W. Dalquest; original No. 7017, W. W. Dalquest.
Range.—From the vicinity of the type locality on the arid coastal plain of the lowlands of central Veracruz. See figure 1.
Diagnosis.—Size small (see measurements); tail long, ranging from 110 to 133 percent of length of head and body; color black, with white areas containing a few black hairs, and in non-hooded phase with white lateral stripes low on sides of body and in some specimens almost absent; skull small but broad across mastoid processes.
Comparisons.—From Mephitis macroura macroura of the southern part of the Mexican Plateau, M. m. eximius differs in shorter head and body, relatively (to body) longer tail, and smaller skull. From Mephitis macroura vittata of the tropical lowlands of the Pacific slope of Oaxaca, M. m. eximius differs in slightly larger average size throughout and relatively longer tail.
Fig. 1. Map showing the geographic ranges of the four subspecies of the species Mephitis macroura.
Remarks.—M. m. eximius is regarded as a subspecies of M. macroura because there is some overlap in size between larger individuals of M. m. eximius and smaller individuals of M. m. macroura. Actually, as indicated above, we doubt that the geographic ranges of the two subspecies are continuous or that the geographic range of M. m. eximius is continuous with the geographic range of M. m. vittata. Small size and relatively long tail characterize both of the lowland, tropical subspecies, eximius and vittata, whereas the two upland subspecies of the temperate areas are larger and have relatively shorter tails.
Habitat closely resembling that at the type locality extends from the southern base of the first mountains north of Jalapa southward as far as the north base of the Tuxtla Mountains—a distance of approximately 110 miles from northwest to southeast along the gulf coast. None of our 5 skins shows the hooded color-pattern so common on the Mexican Plateau and in vittata of Oaxaca. One of our five specimens has well-developed lateral stripes; three have greatly reduced lateral stripes and one is black except for a white spot on the right hip.