Social Sciences Division
Published April 3, 2024 | Version v1
Journal article Open

The ratting of North America: A 350-year retrospective on Rattus species compositions and competition

Creators

  • 1. University of Leicester
  • 2. Indiana University
  • 3. University of York
  • 4. University of West Florida
  • 5. Parks Canada
  • 6. University of Chicago
  • 7. University of Florida
  • 8. Memorial University
  • 9. Jamestown Rediscovery
  • 10. Trent University
  • 11. Université Laval
  • 12. Historic St. Mary's City
  • 13. Florida Public Archaeology Network
  • 14. Alexandria Archaeology
  • 15. Bureau de projet du tramway de Québec
  • 16. University of Maryland
  • 17. University of Arizona
  • 18. Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
  • 19. University of Manchester

Description

While the impacts of black (Rattus rattus) and brown (Rattus norvegicus) rats on human society are well documented—including the spread of disease, broad-scale environmental destruction, and billions spent annually on animal control—little is known about their ecology and behavior in urban areas due to the challenges of studying animals in city environments. We use isotopic and ZooMS analysis of archaeological (1550s–1900 CE) rat remains from eastern North America to provide a large-scale framework for species arrival, interspecific competition, and dietary ecology. Brown rats arrived earlier than expected and rapidly outcompeted black rats in coastal urban areas. This replacement happened despite evidence that the two species occupy different trophic positions. Findings include the earliest molecularly confirmed brown rat in the Americas and show a deep ecological structure to how rats exploit human-structured areas, with implications for understanding urban zoonosis, rat management, and ecosystem planning as well as broader themes of rat dispersal, phylogeny, evolutionary ecology, and climate impacts.

Data availability

All data needed to evaluate the conclusions in the paper are present in the paper and/or the Supplementary Materials.

Files

sciadv.adm6755.pdf

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Additional details

Identifiers

DOI
10.1126/sciadv.adm6755
Other
oai:uchicago.tind.io:11515

Funding

U.S. National Science Foundation
1920835
Wenner-Gren Foundation
9044
UK Research and Innovation
Frontiers in Research
Leverhulme Trust
SRG2021\210629
British Academy
SRG2021\210629
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
Banting Fellowship

UChicago Information

Division(s)
Social Sciences Division
Department(s)
Anthropology