Vittorio Hernandez, Museum Victoria scientists discover the slender rat in Indonesia’s Mount Gandangdewata, International Business Times, 19 April 2016
Researchers from Museum Victoria and an international research team just discovered a new species of rodent. The animal was found on the slopes of Mount Gandangdewata in Sulawesi Islands, Indonesia.
The rodent is the slender rat (Gracilimus radix). It has a unique anatomy, which makes the new discovery also a new genus, a step higher than a new species in the taxonomic ranking.
The slender rat, based on genetic analysis, is the closest relative of the Sulawesi water rat (Waiomys mamasae). The two are from a group of carnivorous rodents endemic and found only in Sulawesi. But the scientists were surprised to discover that the slender rat is omnivorous, not carnivorous.
