Diet of ship rats following a mast event in beech (Nothofagus spp.) forest
Diet of 98 ship rats (Rattus rattus) was investigated by examination of stomach contents. Rats were trapped (as bycatch in stoat traps) from June to December 2006, in the Dart Valley near Lake Wakatipu, New Zealand, after a Nothofagus beech mast. Plant material was found in 43% of all stomachs, invertebrate fragments in 67%, feathers in 8%, hairs in 46% and skin with hairs attached in 12%, and animal (vertebrate and invertebrate) tissue in 76%.