The Rodents of Madagascar: The Seven Genera of Malagasy Rodents

Abstract

Some centuries ago Madagascar was covered with forests and, from the unspoilt areas which still remain, it is possible to form a nearly exact appreciation of the habitat then available everywhere in the island to the vertebrate and invertebrate fauna whose unique nature is known to us. At that time the rodents must have been found over the whole of the island without any break in distribution, and their communities could interpenetrate without any marked ecological barrier arising between them. Probably they then occupied, as they still do — depending on their habits, the seasons or other imprecisely known factors — various localities in the forest : subterranean burrows at the foot of trees or between their roots, holes in dead trees or nests in the upper parts of the trees.