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Species of Tarsomys and Limnomys are found only on the island of Mindanao in the Philippine Archipelago. Both genera were named by Mearns in 1905 but never adequately diagnosed or described, a situation we rectify in this report. Tarsomys contains the type species, T. apoensis, which has been collected only from tropical lower and upper montane rain forest between 5200 and 7500 ft, and a new species, T. echinatus, known by a sample from tropical lowland evergreen rain forest between 2700 and 3700 ft. Limnomys is monotypic and the species L. sibuanus is represented by only five examples obtained from tropical montane rain forest between 6200-7200 and 9000 ft.
Among Philippine murines, the phylogenetic alliances of Tarsomys and Limnomys are with species of Tryphomys, Abditomys, Bullimus, and Rattus. These genera form one of three groups which reflect the broad outlines of a pattern of phylogenetic relationships estimated by us from a preliminary survey of primitive and derived character states among samples of native Philippine murine rodents, based primarily on study skins and skulls. Another group contains the species of Phloeomys, Crateromys, Carpomys, Batomys, Apomys, Crunomys, Archboldomys, Chrotomys, Celaenomys, and Rhynchomys. The final group holds only Anonymomys mindorensis. The relationships of Tarsomys and Limnomys to members within their group are unresolvable within the context of our study.
