One of Australia’s largest native rodents, the Giant White-tailed Rat (Uromys caudimaculatus) has such formidable teeth and jaw strength, they have been known to eat through steel garbage bins. They are also capable of dispersing large-seeded tree species in Australian tropical rain forests, including some that have no alternate vector, such as the magnificent Yellow Walnut (Beilschmiedia bancrofti) (Lauraceae).
When I first settled into the Daintree rainforest, I was surprised by the local council’s provision of free rodenticide for “vermin control”. Never mind that these were protected species and inhabitants of World Heritage estate, apparently they were rats first and foremost and therefore vermin.
There is quite a diversity of native rodent fauna in the Daintree rainforest, but as far as I know, no introduced species. The Bush Rat (Rattus fuscipes coracius) looks most like the notorious Black Rat (Rattus rattus) of bubonic infamy, but even these are protected by legislation.
Over the years, newcomers settling into the rainforest have expressed dismay at the intrusion of rodents with not the slightest regard for the meticulously installed barriers of fly-wire mesh. Aggrieved home-owners almost invariably resort to trapping the trespassers, as sensitively as possible, and transporting them to a remote corner of the Daintree for release. Like-minded counterparts could very possibly be doing the same thing, from the opposite direction and it would be interesting to know how this shuttling of rats around the rainforest affected their social dynamics, for it most certainly does not affect the continued breaching of residential boundaries. Residents either accepted the inevitable or leave.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
Nice pics but you should rewrite the first sentence. Their size&range is much smaller than Echidna&Red Kangaroo respectively. Certainly one of our largest rodents but some of our arid zone rodents would have much larger ranges.
You’re right Andrew. Changes made.
Never mind that these were protected species and inhabitants of World Heritage estate, apparently they were rats first and foremost and therefore vermin.
That’s bureaucracy for you.
Excellent photography.
Jan,
Bureaucracy is unencumbered by both protected species status and WH inhabitancy.
Got any Talon-G?
Neil,
“Bureaucracy is unencumbered by both protected species status and WH inhabitancy.”
It’s a shame.
I have no Talon-G. There is a bit of Coumadin about at work but we give that to patients with a tendency to develop blood clots at inconvenient times and places.
It is ironic that in matters of anticoagulants and bureaucracy that leeches produce the most effective anti-clotting compounds.
I think the bureaucratic leeches are by far the worst of the lot.
This morning, my eight-year-old daughter heard squeaking from her grandmother’s back-pack. From the inner compartment, an adult fawn-footed melomys http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/001821.html
escaped with one of its two young. The other was released behind the fridge to be reunited with its family.
Maybe nice rats should be called ‘Rattys’. Image, and all that…
I live in Nimbin, in northern NSW. A couple of months ago while weeding the gully near my house, I found the recently-deceased body of a female white-tailed rat. I’d never seen one
before, and took several pictures before I buried it.
When I asked around about this rat, no one had ever heard of or seen it. I have several biologists and native animal enthusiasts as friends, and they’d never seen one.
Yesterday morning I found another deceased (male) white-tailed rat on the street – so the first one was not an anomaly. Apparently we have a breeding population in this area.
The two rats that I found are a lovely gray-brown on top, the fur is very soft and resembles mink. The underbelly is gray at the base of the hairs, with orangey-gold tips. Feet are white. The tail is lightly furred, not naked as in the pictures here. Really quite lovely, for
a rat. And definitely NOT a possum.
They were much smaller than the ‘giant’ rats described on your website. These two were perhaps only a little larger than a healthy adult rattus rattus.
Has anyone else ever seen these rats? Where might I find some info about them? Anyway, if this is of interest to you or anyone else, I would be happy to send the pictures that I took.
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