Giant pouched rat

Giant pouched rat Temporal range: Recent
Cricetomys emini
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Rodentia
Family:	Nesomyidae
Subfamily:	Cricetomyinae
Genus:	Cricetomys Waterhouse, 1840
Species
Cricetomys ansorgei Cricetomys emini Cricetomys gambianus Cricetomys kivuensis

The giant pouched rats (genus Cricetomys) of sub-Saharan Africa are large muroid rodents. Their head and body length ranges from 25–45 cm (9–18 in) with scaly tails ranging from 36–46 cm (14–18 in). They weigh between 1–1.5 kg.

Natural history

Giant pouched rats are only distantly related to the true rats, but are instead part of an ancient radiation of African and Malagasy muroids in the family Nesomyidae. They are named due to their large cheek pouches.

It has been suggested that females may be capable of producing up to 10 litters yearly. Gestation is 27–36 days. One to five young are born at time. Females have eight nipples.

The animals are nocturnal. They are omnivorous and feed on vegetation and invertebrates. They have a particular taste for palm nuts. They are coprophagous.

They can become tame and are kept as pets. They are also an important food source in many African countries.

Ability to detect land mines and tuberculosis by scent

HeroRAT finds landmine in training field in Morogoro, Tanzania

These rats are also becoming useful in some areas for detecting land mines, as their acute sense of smell is very effective in detecting explosives, and they are light enough to not detonate any of the mines.^[1][2] The rats are being trained by APOPO, a non-profit social venture based in Tanzania.

The procedure for training rats to detect land mines was conceived of and developed by Bart Weetjens of the Netherlands. Training starts at four weeks of age when the rats are handled to accustom them to humans and exposed to a variety of sights and sounds. They learn to associate a clicker with a food reward of banana or banana-peanut paste. They are then trained to indicate a hole with TNT in it by nosing it for five seconds. Then they learn to find the correct hole in a line of holes. Finally, the rat is trained to wear a harness and practises outdoors on a lead, finding inactivated mines under soil. At the end of their training they are tested: they must find all the mines in an area of 400 square metres that has been seeded with inactivated mines. It's a blind test: their handlers do not know where the mines are. If they succeed, they are certified as bomb-sniffing rats. It is cheaper to train a rat than a dog an cheaper to find land mines using rats.^[3]

APOPO is also training the rats to detect tuberculosis by sniffing sputum samples; the rats can test many more samples than a scientist using more traditional methods—hundreds in a day vs. 30 or 40.^[4] Land mine and tuberculosis sniffing rats are called HeroRATs.

Species

Genus Cricetomys - Giant pouched rats Southern Giant Pouched Rat, Cricetomys ansorgei Gambian Pouched Rat, Cricetomys gambianus Emin's Pouched Rat, Cricetomys emini Kivu Giant Pouched Rat, Cricetomys kivuensis

In Pop Culture

Ben in the 2003 remake of Willard was a giant pouched rat^{[citation needed]}.

Sightings In Boston

Recently due to the extraordinarily warm summer in Massachusetts the giant pouched rat has been sighted in the Boston area, namely in and around Brighton/Brookline. One resident of Kilsyth Road spotted one of the creatures whilst walking her dog late one night. "I was walking along my road when I noticed something out of the corner of my eye, I turned around and at first I thought it was a cat, but when it ran into the light of a streetlamp I screamed in horror. I rushed home immediately, I was so shook up."

The rats are said to be living on the large amounts of garbage left outside by students and young professionals in the area.

Notes

1. ^ Wood, Ian (18 Dec. 2007). "Rats being used to sniff out land mines". Telegraph.co.uk. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/3319113/Rats-being-used-to-sniff-out-land-mines.html. Retrieved 2008-11-23. 
2. ^ Giant rats sniff out Mozambique's mines IOL
3. ^ Weetjens, Bart. How I taught rats to sniff out land mines, TED Talks, Rotterdam, 2010 (accessed 2011-09-16)
4. ^ "Fighting Tuberculosis". herorat.org. Archived from the original on 2008-08-04. http://web.archive.org/web/20080804041055/http://www.herorat.org/en/fightingtuberculosis. Retrieved 2008-11-23. 

See also

• APOPO
• Gambian Pouch Rat

References

• Nowak, R. M. 1999. Walker's Mammals of the World, Vol. 2. Johns Hopkins University Press, London

External links

• "apopo" mine clearance agency
• HeroRAT website for APOPO's Giant pouched rats
• EKF: African Giant Pouched Rat Forum
• UKpouchies, free information site, live rat cams, dedicated forum
• National Pouched Rat Society, NPRS Pouched Rat Society