Dipodomys ordii
Ord Kangaroo Rat
Dipodomys ordii is a medium sized, relatively short-tailed, five-toed species of a color about average for the genus. As in other members of the genus, the hind legs and feet are disproportionately long as an adaptation to the saltatorial mode of progression. The upperparts are buffy, reddish or blackish, depending on the subspecies, but the entire ventral surface, dorsal surfaces of the hind feet, supraorbital and postauricular spots, forelimbs, hip stripes, lateral stripes of the tail and the tail at the base are pure white. The skull has a relatively short rostrum, moderate to large auditory bullae, relatively wide interparietal, relatively wide maxillary arches and grooved upper incisors.
The only other five-toed kangaroo rats with which Dipodomys ordii, at places, shares its geographic range, are Dipodomys panamintinus and Dipodomys microps. Dipodomys ordii can be distinguished from Dipodomys panamintinus by smaller size (for instance the hind foot is shorter instead of longer than, 44 mm.) and narrower expanse of maxillary arches in relation to breadth across the auditory bullae, and from Dipodomys microps by the awl-shaped, instead of chisel-shaped, lower incisors.
The species D. ordii is divisible into 35 subspecies, accounts of which follow:
Dipodomys ordii richardsoni (Allen)
Dipodops richardsoni Allen, Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 3:277, June 30, 1891.
Dipodomys phillippi, Knox, Trans. Kansas Acad. Sci., 4:22, 1875, (part—the part from Osborne, Kansas).
Dipodomys phillipsi ordi, [Coues and Allen], Monogr. North American Rodentia, p. 542, 1877 (part—the part from Ft. Cobb, Oklahoma).