Generic Combinations

• Rattus lutreolus (J.E. Gray, 1841).

Introduction

Mahoney (1988: 184) listed synonyms, rather than subspecies.

Distribution

States

New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria

Extra Distribution Information

Kangaroo Is.

IBRA

NSW, Qld, SA, Tas, Vic: Australian Alps (AA), Brigalow Belt North (BBN), Brigalow Belt South (BBS), Ben Lomond (BEL), Central Mackay Coast (CMC), Cape York Peninsula (CYP), Desert Uplands (DEU), Einasleigh Uplands (EIU), Eyre Yorke Block (EYB), Flinders Lofty Block (FLB), Flinders (FLI), Gawler (GAW), Kanmantoo (KAN), King (KIN), Murray Darling Depression (MDD), Naracoorte Coastal Plain (NCP), NSW North Coast (NNC), Sydney Basin (SB), South East Coastal Plain (SCP), South East Corner (SEC), South Eastern Highlands (SEH), South Eastern Queensland (SEQ), Tasmanian Central Highlands (TCH), Tasmanian Northern Midlands (TNM), Tasmanian Northern Slopes (TNS), Tasmanian South East (TSE), Tasmanian Southern Ranges (TSR), Tasmanian West (TWE), Victorian Midlands (VM), Victorian Volcanic Plain (VVP), Wet Tropics (WT)

Original AFD Distribution Data

Australian Region

• Australia
  • New South Wales: SE coastal
  • Queensland: NE coastal
  • South Australia: S Gulfs, SE coastal
  • Tasmania
  • Victoria: SE coastal

Ecological Descriptors

Arthropod-feeder, burrower, closed forest, coastal, folivore, granivore, noctidiurnal, open heath, predator, subtropical, terrestrial, territorial.

General References

Baverstock, P.R., Watts, C.H.S., Adams, M. & Cole, S.R. 1981. Genetical relationships among Australian rodents (Muridae). Australian Journal of Zoology 29: 289-303

Baverstock, P.R., Watts, C.H.S., Hogarth, J.T., Robinson, A.C. & Robinson, J.F. 1977. Chromosome evolution in Australian rodents II. The Rattus Group. Chromosoma (Berlin) 61: 227-241

Bezzobs, T. & Sanson, G. 1997. The effects of plant and tooth structure on intake and digestibility in two small mammalian herbivores. Physiological Zoology 70: 338-351

Braithwaite, R.W. 1980. The ecology of Rattus lutreolus II. Reproductive tactics. Australian Wildlife Research 7: 53-62

Braithwaite, R.W. 1980. The ecology of Rattus lutreolus III. The rise and fall of a commensal population. Australian Wildlife Research 7: 199-215

Braithwaite, R.W. 1982. Small marginal groups of Rattus lutreolus in good and poor habitat. Journal of Zoology, London 198: 529-532

Braithwaite, R.W. & Lee, A.K. 1979. The ecology of Rattus lutreolus I. A Victorian heathland population. Australian Wildlife Research 6: 173-189

Breed, W.J. & Sarafis, V. 1979. On the phylogenetic significance of spermatozoal morphology and male reproductive tract anatomy in Australian rodents. Transactions of the Royal Society of South Australia 103: 127-135

Catling, P.C. 1986. Rattus lutreolus, colonizer of heathland after fire in the absence of Pseudomys species. Australian Wildlife Research 13: 127-139

Cheal, D.C. 1987. The diets and dietary preferences of Rattus fuscipes and Rattus lutreolus at Walkerville in Victoria. Australian Wildlife Research 14: 35-44

Claridge, A.W. & May, T.W. 1994. Mycophagy among Australian mammals. Australian Journal of Ecology 19: 251-275

Fox, B.J. 1979. Growth and development of Rattus lutreolus (Rodentia: Muridae) in the laboratory. Australian Journal of Zoology 27: 945-957

Fox, B.J., Taylor, J.E. & Thompson, P.T. 2003. Experimental manipulation of habitat structure: a retrogression of the small mammal succession. Journal of Animal Ecology 72: 927-940

Fox, B.J. & Murray, J.D. 1979. Laboratory hybridization of Australian Rattus fuscipes and Rattus lutreolus and its karyotypic confirmation. Australian Journal of Zoology 27: 691-698

Haering, R. & Fox, B.J. 1995. Habitat utilization patterns of sympatric populations of Pseudomys gracilicaudatus and Rattus lutreolus in coastal heathland: a multivariate analysis. Australian Journal of Ecology 20: 427-441

Higgs, P. & Fox, B.J. 1993. Interspecific competition: A mechanism for rodent succession after fire in a wet heathland. Australian Journal of Ecology 18: 193-201

Ledloff, A.C. 2000. The design and analysis of mark-recapture studies using habitat utilisation by the grassland melomys (Melomys burtoni) and the swamp rat (Rattus lutreolus) in a coastal heathland of Bribie Island, south-east Queensland, as a model system. PhD. thesis. Brisbane : Queensland University of Technology.

Lunney, D. 1995. Swamp Rat Rattus lutreolus. pp. 655-657 in Strahan, R. (ed.). The Mammals of Australia: The National Photographic Index of Australian Wildlife. Sydney : Reed New Holland 756 pp.

Luo, J., Monamy, V. & Fox, B.J. 1998. Competition between two Australian rodent species - a regression analysis. Journal of Mammalogy 79: 962-971

Luo, J. & Fox, B.J. 1996. Seasonal and successional dietary shifts of two sympatric rodents in coastal heathland: A possible mechanism for coexistence. Australian Journal of Ecology 21: 121-132

Mahoney, J.A. in Walton, D.W. (ed.) 1988. Zoological Catalogue of Australia Volume 5. Mammalia. Canberra : Australian Government Publishing Service x 274 pp. [Date published 13/Apr/1988] [184]

Maitz, W.E. & Dickman, C.R. 2001. Competition and habitat use in native Australian Rattus: is competition intense, or important? Oecologia 128: 526-538

Mallick, S.A. 1992. Urine-marking in three species of Rattus. Wildlife Research 19: 89-93

Monamy, V. 1995. Ecophysiology of a wild-living population of the velvet-furred rat, Rattus lutreolus velutinus (Rodentia: Muridae), in Tasmania. Australian Journal of Zoology 43: 583-600

Monamy, V. 1995. Population dynamics of, and habitat use by, Australian native rodents in wet sclerophyll forest, Tasmania. I. Rattus lutreolus velutinus. Wildlife Research 22: 647-660

Monamy, V. 1997. Sexual differences in habitat use by Rattus lutreolus (Rodentia: Muridae): The emergence of patterns in native rodent community structure. Australian Mammalogy 20: 43-48

Monomy, V. 1996. Are capture rates of free-living velvet-furred rats, Rattus lutreolus velutinus (Rodentia: Muridae) influenced by residual conspecific odour? Australian Mammalogy 19: 53-54

Monomy, V. & Fox, B.J. 2000. Small succession is determined by vegetation density rather than time elapsed since disturbance. Austral Ecology 25: 580-587

Morris, D.W., Fox, B.J., Luo, J. & Monomy, V. 2000. Habitat-dependent competition and the co-existence of Australian heathland rodents. Oikos 91: 294-306

Morrissey, B.L. & Breed, W.G. 1982. Variation in external morphology of the glans penis of Australian native rodents. Australian Journal of Zoology 30: 495-502

Norton, T.W. 1987. The ecology of small mammals in north-eastern Tasmania II. Pseudomys novaehollandiae and the introduced Mus Musculus. Australian Wildlife Research 14: 435-441

Norton, T.W. 1987. The effect of trap placement on trapping success of Rattus lutreolus velutinus (Thomas)(Muridae: Rodentia) in northeast Tasmania. Journal of Mammalogy 68: 617-641

Taylor, J.M. & Horner, B.E. 1973. Reproductive characteristics of wild native Australian Rattus (Rodentia: Muridae). Australian Journal of Zoology 21: 437-475

Taylor, J.M. & Horner, B.E. 1973. Results of the Archbold Expeditions. No. 98. Systematics of native Australian Rattus (Rodentia, Muridae). Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 150: 1-130

Thompson, P. & Fox, B.J. 1993. Asymmetric competition in Australian heathland rodents: a reciprocal removal experiment demonstrating the influence of size-class structure. Oikos 67: 264-278

Watts, C.H.S. 1982. The husbandry of Australian Rattus. pp. 177-179 in Evans, D.D. (ed.). The Management of Australian Mammals in Captivity. Proceedings of the Scientific Meeting of the Australian Mammal Society, Healesville, Victoria, February 1979. Melbourne : Zoological Board of Victoria 194 pp.

Watts, C.H.S. & Aslin, H.J. 1981. The Rodents of Australia. Sydney : Angus & Robertson xii 321 pp. 16 pls.

Common Name References

ABRS 2001. Census of Australian Vertebrates. Australian Biological Resources Study. (Swamp Rat)

History of changes

• Rattus lacus Tate, G.H.H. 1951. Results of the Archbold Expeditions. No. 65 The rodents of Australia and New Guinea. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 97: 183-430 [347].

  Type data:

   Holotype AMNH 107312 ♂ skin & skull, Lake Barrine, QLD 2400 ft (among bladey grass).
• Rattus lutreolus imbil Troughton, E. le G. 1937. On new forms of the Eastern Swamp Rat, and the relationship of Mastacomys. The Australian Zoologist 8: 281-286 [283].

  Type data:

   Holotype AM M6228 ♂ skin & skull, Imbil, QLD.

Distribution

States

Queensland

Extra Distribution Information

Atherton Tableland.

IBRA

Qld: Central Mackay Coast (CMC), Wet Tropics (WT)

Ecological Descriptors

Arthropod-feeder, burrower, closed forest, coastal, folivore, granivore, noctidiurnal, open heath, predator, subtropical, terrestrial, territorial.

History of changes

• Mus lutreola Gray, J.E. 1841. Contributions towards the geographical distribution of the Mammalia in Australia, with notes on some recently discovered species, in a letter addressed to the Author. Appendix C. pp. 397-414 in Grey, G. (ed.). Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-west and Western Australia During the Years 1837, 38, and 39, Under the Authority of Her Majesty's Government. Describing many newly discovered, important, and fertile districts, with observations on the moral and physical condition of the aboriginal inhabitants, &c. &c. London : T. & W. Boone Vol. 2 vii 482 pp. [Date published Nov. 1841] [398-399, 404, 409-410, 414].

  Type data:

   Lectotype BMNH 41.1258 ♂ skin & skull, Moscheto (as Mosquito) Is., Hunter River, NSW.
• Mus vellerosus Gray, J.E. 1847. Description of a new rat from South Australia. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 1847: 5-6 [publication date established from Sclater, P.L. 1893. List of the dates of receipt from the Printers of the sheets of the Society's 'Proceedings' from 1831 to 1859 inclusive. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 1893: 435–440 [438]] [5].

  Type data:

   Lectotype BMNH 47.3.1.2 ♂ skin & skull, between the Murray River, SA and Glenelg River, VIC (as in campis Australiasianis inter fluvios Murray et Glenelg).
• Rattus lutreolus cambricus Troughton, E. le G. 1937. On new forms of the Eastern Swamp Rat, and the relationship of Mastacomys. The Australian Zoologist 8: 281-286 [283].

  Type data:

   Holotype AM M3192 ♂ skin & skull, Booloombayt, Myall Lakes District, NSW.

Distribution

States

New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Victoria

IBRA

NSW, Qld, SA, Vic: Australian Alps (AA), Flinders Lofty Block (FLB), Kanmantoo (KAN), Naracoorte Coastal Plain (NCP), NSW North Coast (NNC), Sydney Basin (SB), South East Coastal Plain (SCP), South East Corner (SEC), South Eastern Highlands (SEH), South Eastern Queensland (SEQ), Victorian Midlands (VM), Victorian Volcanic Plain (VVP)

Ecological Descriptors

Arthropod-feeder, burrower, closed forest, coastal, folivore, granivore, noctidiurnal, open heath, predator, subtropical, terrestrial, territorial.

History of changes

• Mus velutinus Thomas, O. 1882. On two new Muridae from Tasmania. Annals and Magazine of Natural History 5 9: 413-416 [415].

  Type data:

   Lectotype BMNH 77.7.3.1 ♀ skin & skull, TAS.
• Mus pachyurus Higgins, E.T. & Petterd, W.F. 1884. Descriptions of new Tasmanian animals. Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania 1883: 181-184, pl.196 [Date published before 25 June 1884: publication date established from Anon. 1953. Annual Report, 1952. Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania 87: ii–viii [vi]] [182].

  Type data:

   Syntype(s) whereabouts unknown (not preserved, see Lord, C.E. 1918. Notes on the mammals of Tasmania. Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania 1918: 16–52 [25–26] and Lord, C.E. & Scott, H.H. 1924. A Synopsis of the Vertebrate Animals of Tasmania. Hobart : Oldham, Beddome & Meredith 340 pp. 41 pls [300]), Long Plains, TAS.
• Mus tetragonurus Higgins, E.T. & Petterd, W.F. 1884. Description of a new species of Mus, with a list of the terrestrial animals of Tasmania. Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania 1883: 195-198 [195] [junior homonym of Mus tetragonurus Kelaart, 1850].

  Type data:

   Syntype(s) whereabouts unknown (not preserved, see Lord, C.E. 1918. Notes on the mammals of Tasmania. Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania 1918: 16–52 [25–26] and Lord, C.E. & Scott, H.H. 1924. A Synopsis of the Vertebrate Animals of Tasmania. Hobart : Oldham, Beddome & Meredith 340 pp. 41 pls [300]), Mt Cameron and Springfield, Tas.
• Mus (Epimys) petterdi Trouessart, E.-L. 1904. Catalogus Mammalium tam Viventium quam Fossilium. Quinquennale supplementum, anno 1904. Fasc. II. Rodentia. Berolini : R. Friedländer & Sohn pp. 289-546. [373] [nom. nov. for Mus tetragonurus Higgins & Petterd, 1884].

  Type data:

   Syntype(s).

Distribution

States

Tasmania

Extra Distribution Information

Also Bass Strait Ils.

IBRA

Tas: Ben Lomond (BEL), Flinders (FLI), King (KIN), Tasmanian Central Highlands (TCH), Tasmanian Northern Midlands (TNM), Tasmanian Northern Slopes (TNS), Tasmanian South East (TSE), Tasmanian Southern Ranges (TSR), Tasmanian West (TWE)

Original AFD Distribution Data

Australian Region

• Australia
  • Tasmania

Ecological Descriptors

Arthropod-feeder, burrower, closed forest, coastal, folivore, granivore, noctidiurnal, open heath, predator, subtropical, terrestrial, territorial.

History of changes