The Manipur bush rat (''Hadromys humei''), also known as Hume's rat or Hume's hadromys, is a species of

rodent Rodents (from Latin , 'to gnaw') are mammals of the order Rodentia (), which are characterized by a single pair of continuously growing incisors in each of the upper and lower jaws. About 40% of all mammal species are rodents. They are na ...

in the family

Muridae The Muridae, or murids, are the largest family of rodents and of mammals, containing approximately 1,383 species, including many species of mice, rats, and gerbils found naturally throughout Eurasia, Africa, and Australia. The name Muridae come ...

. It is found in northeastern

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

, and is listed as endangered.

Range and habitat

The species is endemic to

northeast India , native_name_lang = mni , settlement_type = , image_skyline = , image_alt = , image_caption = , motto = , image_map = Northeast india.png , ...

, and has been recorded from several localities. These are: Angarakhata in Kamrup district (

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

Bishnupur Bishnupur or Vishnupur may refer to: Administrative divisions * Bishnupur district in Manipur, India * Bishnupur district, West Bengal in West Bengal, India * Bishnupur subdivision in West Bengal, India Municipal division * Bishnupur Rural Munic ...

, Imphal, Senapati and Karong (specimen FMNH 76562) in Manipur. Originally thought to occur in

Yunnan Yunnan , () is a landlocked Provinces of China, province in Southwest China, the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is ...

in China also, the Chinese animals have been reclassified as '' Hadromys yunnanensis'' Yang & Wang 1987. The

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

record shows that populations of the Manipur Bush Rat existed all over

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

right down to the Thai-Malay border during the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological Epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fina ...

. During that time, the Indo-Malayan region may have had a cooler and drier climate with savanna-like regions. A related species is known from the

Siwalik The Sivalik Hills, also known as the Shivalik Hills and Churia Hills, are a mountain range of the outer Himalayas that stretches over about from the Indus River eastwards close to the Brahmaputra River, spanning the northern parts of the Indian ...

fossils from northern

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...

. These findings indicate that ''Hadromys humei'' is probably a "relict" species. The Manipur bush rat occurs at medium altitudes from above sea level. It inhabits tropical evergreen, moist deciduous and evergreen forests and also found in secondary forests in northeastern India.

Discovery

The murid was described by

Oldfield Thomas Michael Rogers Oldfield Thomas (21 February 1858 – 16 June 1929) was a British zoologist. Career Thomas worked at the Natural History Museum on mammals, describing about 2,000 new species and subspecies for the first time. He was appoin ...

in 1886 from specimens in the

Manipur Manipur () ( mni, Kangleipak) is a state in Northeast India, with the city of Imphal as its capital. It is bounded by the Indian states of Nagaland to the north, Mizoram to the south and Assam to the west. It also borders two regions of Myanm ...

collection of Allan Octavian Hume, which was donated to the

British Museum (Natural History) The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum an ...

after Hume's life's work in ornithological notes were sold by a servant as waste paper. The Manipur Bush Rat was named in his honour. The collection has two male and two female specimens, recorded to be collected on 23 March 1881 from "Moirang" (in Manipur), the type locality for this species.

Description

The specimen has been described by Thomas (1886) as: The head and body length of the largest specimen, a female, was long while the tail is long. Elsewhere, the head and body length has been given as head and body length as , the tail length as . The weight has been recorded as ranging from .

Conservation status

The species has been given conservation status of "Endangered - B1ab(iii)+2ab(iii)" in

IUCN Red List The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is the world's most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biol ...

ver 3.1. The criteria for this assessment include: * Limited area of occurrence (less than ). * Limited geographical extent of range (less than ). * Less than five areas from which it is reported. * Continuing decline in extent and degradation of habitat. The principal threats to this species are assessed to be loss of and degradation of habitat, fragmentation, and encroachment. Besides these, hunting and fire are also considered to be contributing causes.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q301829 Rats of Asia Hadromys Endemic fauna of India Rodents of India Environment of Manipur Endangered fauna of Asia Mammals described in 1886 Taxa named by Oldfield Thomas Taxonomy articles created by Polbot