Animalia > Chordata > Mammalia > Rodentia > Muridae > Rattus > Rattus exulans

Rattus exulans (Polynesian rat)

Synonyms:

Wikipedia Abstract

The Polynesian rat, or Pacific rat (Rattus exulans), known to the Māori as kiore, is the third most widespread species of rat in the world behind the brown rat and black rat. The Polynesian rat originated in Southeast Asia, but like its relatives, has become well-traveled – infiltrating Fiji and most Polynesian islands, including New Zealand, Easter Island, and Hawaii. With them it shares the ability to easily adapt to many different types of environments, from grasslands to forests. Its habits are also similar, becoming closely associated with humans because of the easy access to food. As a result, it has become a major pest in almost all areas within its distribution.
View Wikipedia Record: Rattus exulans

Invasive Species

View ISSG Record: Rattus exulans

EDGE Analysis

Uniqueness Scale: Similiar (0) 
1
 Unique (100)
Uniqueness & Vulnerability Scale: Similiar & Secure (0) 
14
 Unique & Vulnerable (100)
ED Score: 4.23
EDGE Score: 1.66
Learn more at EDGE of Existence programme

Attributes

Adult Weight [1]  40 grams
Birth Weight [2]  3 grams
Diet [3]  Carnivore (Invertebrates), Frugivore, Granivore, Herbivore
Diet - Fruit [3]  20 %
Diet - Invertibrates [3]  30 %
Diet - Plants [3]  10 %
Diet - Seeds [3]  40 %
Forages - Ground [3]  100 %
Female Maturity [2]  3 months 1 day
Gestation [2]  22 days
Litter Size [2]  4
Litters / Year [2]  4
Maximum Longevity [2]  4 years
Nocturnal [3]  Yes
Snout to Vent Length [2]  4.724 inches (12 cm)

Ecoregions

Protected Areas

Biodiversity Hotspots

Name Location Endemic Species Website
Indo-Burma Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Viet Nam No
Sundaland Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand No

Prey / Diet

Didymocheton spectabilis[4]
Hemideina thoracica (Common tree weta)[4]
Odontria xanthosticta[4]

Prey / Diet Overlap

Competing SpeciesCommon Prey Count
Callaeas cinereus (Kokako)1
Heliothrips haemorrhoidalis (Greenhouse thrip)1

Predators

Consumers

Range Map

External References

NatureServe Explorer

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1Felisa A. Smith, S. Kathleen Lyons, S. K. Morgan Ernest, Kate E. Jones, Dawn M. Kaufman, Tamar Dayan, Pablo A. Marquet, James H. Brown, and John P. Haskell. 2003. Body mass of late Quaternary mammals. Ecology 84:3403
♦ 2Nathan P. Myhrvold, Elita Baldridge, Benjamin Chan, Dhileep Sivam, Daniel L. Freeman, and S. K. Morgan Ernest. 2015. An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96:3109
♦ 3Hamish Wilman, Jonathan Belmaker, Jennifer Simpson, Carolina de la Rosa, Marcelo M. Rivadeneira, and Walter Jetz. 2014. EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals. Ecology 95:2027
♦ 4OBSERVATIONS ON FOODS OF KIORE (RATTUS EXULANS) FOUND IN HUSKING STATIONS ON NORTHERN OFFSHORE ISLANDS OF NEW ZEALAND, D. J. CAMPBELL, H. MOLLER, G. W. RAMSAY and J. C. WAIT, New Zealand Journal of Ecology 7: 131-138 (1984)
♦ 5del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.
♦ 6Jorrit H. Poelen, James D. Simons and Chris J. Mungall. (2014). Global Biotic Interactions: An open infrastructure to share and analyze species-interaction datasets. Ecological Informatics.
♦ 7The diet of moreporks (Ninox novaeseelandiae) in relation to prey availability, and their roost site characteristics and breeding success on Ponui Island, Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand., Kirsty Marie Denny, A thesis presented in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Ecology at Massey University, Albany New Zealand. (2009)
♦ 8Gibson, D. I., Bray, R. A., & Harris, E. A. (Compilers) (2005). Host-Parasite Database of the Natural History Museum, London
♦ 9International Flea Database
Ecoregions provided by World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF). WildFinder: Online database of species distributions, ver. 01.06 Wildfinder Database
Biodiversity Hotspots provided by Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0