Oryzomys antillarum
| Oryzomys antillarum | |
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| Holotype skull, seen from above (A), below (B) and the left (C) | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Rodentia |
| Family: | Cricetidae |
| Genus: | Oryzomys |
| Species: | O. antillarum |
| Binomial name | |
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Oryzomys antillarum Thomas, 1898 |
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| Distribution of Oryzomys antillarum (green) and other species of Oryzomys, including O. couesi (red) and the marsh rice rat (O. palustris; blue) | |
| Synonyms | |
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Oryzomys antillarum, also known as the Jamaican rice rat, is an extinct rodent of Jamaica. A member of the genus Oryzomys within the family Cricetidae, it is similar to O. couesi of mainland Central America, from where it may have dispersed to its island during the last glacial period. O. antillarum is common in subfossil cave faunas and is also known from three specimens collected live in the 19th century. Some historical records of Jamaican rats may pertain to it. The species probably became extinct late in the 19th century, perhaps due to the introduction of the small Asian mongoose, competition with introduced rodents such as the brown rat, and habitat destruction.
Oryzomys antillarum was a medium-sized rat, similar in most respects to Oryzomys couesi. The head and body length was 120 to 132 mm (4.7 to 5.2 in) and the skull was about 30 mm (1.2 in) long. The upperparts were reddish and graded into the yellowish underparts. The tail was about as long as the head and body, sparsely haired, and darker above than below. The species differed from O. couesi in having longer nasal bones, shorter incisive foramina (perforations of the front part of the palate), and more robust zygomatic arches (cheekbones).
In his 1877 monograph on North American rodents, Elliott Coues mentioned two specimens of Oryzomys from Jamaica in the collections of the United States National Museum (USNM). According to Coues, the specimens were similar to the marsh rice rat (Oryzomys palustris) of the United States, but different in color. Although he wrote that they probably represented a separate form, he refrained from giving a scientific name to them because of the possibility that the form had already received a name he did not know of. The species was first formally described by Oldfield Thomas in 1898 based on a specimen that had been in the British Museum of Natural History since 1845. He recognized it as a separate species of Oryzomys, Oryzomys antillarum, but wrote that it was related to the mainland Central American O. couesi. Thomas suspected that the species was already extinct on Jamaica, but that it or a similar rice rat could still be found in the unexplored interior of Cuba or Hispaniola.
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