On 21 November 1995, a woodcutter felled a Japanese Ceder tree (Cryptomeria japonica) with a cavity containing three young of the Japanese flying squirrel (Pteromys momonga) which were captured. The nest tree was located in Kamitonokuchi (135°15'E, 35° 58'N), Sabae City, Fukui Prefecture, in a ceder plantation at an elevation of about 140m. Young were two females (F1, F2) and one male (M1). At the time captured, the eyes of two young (F1, M1) were open previously, and another one (F2) opened her eyes two days later (23, November). In captive Eurasian flying squirrel (Hokkaido subspecies) P. volans orii, young first opened their eyes at about 35 days: assuming that these young were born in mid-October. To our knowledge, this is the first record of the late fall breeding of P. momonga. Present and some past records of breeding suggest that P. momonga has two distinct annual birth periods. The mean weights and linear measurements of these young P. momonga were consistently larger than those of P. volans orii at the same stage. Especially, hind foot length of young P. momonga was longer than that of adult P. volans orii. For a period of several days (5-7 days) after eyes opened, a young P. momonga emitted low-frequency calls continually, on being removed from a nest. Sound characteristics of young P. momonga were generally similar to those of young P. volans orii. Thus, this sound may induce mother to search for and retrieve her young as well as P. volans orii. The diploid chromosome number (2n) of P. momonga examined in this study was 38 and was identical to that of P. volans orii, however, the karyotypes of two species differed slightly in the chromosome constitutions. In addition, it has presented so far that No.17 chromosome of P. volans orii carried a typical satellite on its short arm, while a conspicuous secondary constriction instead of the satellite was observed on the long arm of No.5 chromosome of P. momonga.
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