Rattus fuscipes Waterhouse 1839

Rattus fuscipes Waterhouse 1839, Zool. Voy. H. M. S. "Beagle", Mammalia: 66.

Type Locality: Australia, Western Australia, Albany, "Little Grove" on Princess Royal Harbor, 4 mi (6 km) S Mt Melville (as restricted by neotype designation by Taylor and Horner, 1973; also see Mahoney and Richardson, 1988).

Vernacular Names: Australian Bush Rat.

Synonyms: Rattus assimilis (Gould 1858); Rattus brazenori Tate 1940; Rattus coracius Thomas 1923; Rattus glauerti Thomas 1926; Rattus greyii (Gray 1841); Rattus manicatus (Gould 1858); Rattus mondraineus Thomas 1921; Rattus murrayi Thomas 1923; Rattus peccatus Troughton 1937; Rattus pelori Finlayson 1960; Rattus ravus Brazenor 1936 .

Distribution: Coastal, subcoastal, and offshore islands of SW Western Australia; S coast from Eyre Peninsula in South Australia (Robinson et al., 2000) to W Victoria; coastal and subcoastal Victoria from Otway Peninsula north to near Rockhampton in Queensland; coastal Queensland from Townsville to Cooktown (Lunney, 1995 a:652; Seebeck, 1995 c:225; Taylor and Horner, 1973:15).

Conservation: IUCN – Lower Risk (lc).

Discussion: Rattus fuscipes species group. Taylor and Horner (1973) suggested, on morphological grounds, that the Queensland population of R. fuscipes ( coracius) has a common ancestry with Queensland R. leucopus, a hypothesis reasserted by Taylor et al. (1982, 1983). This relationship, however, is unsupported by either chromosomal (Dennis and Menzies, 1978) or allozymic data (Baverstock et al., 1983 a, 1986). Reviewed by Taylor and Horner (1973), Watts and Aslin (1981), Mahoney and Richardson (1988), and Lunney (1995 a). See Taylor and Calaby (1988 a, Mammalian Species, 298). The name manicatus was included in the synonymy of Rattus fuscipes by Taylor and Horner (1973), but listed as incertae sedis by Mahoney and Richardson (1988:192).