Talk:Brown rat

Alberta

see https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File_talk:Brown_rat_distribution.png#Alberta as well as even older "HOAX map removed" discussion on this page

also see the comments on the edits and reverts in https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brown_rat_distribution.png

I don't purpose to advocate for one side of the debate or the other, but it really gnaws at me how wonky the borders are in the Alberta-marked versions of the file. So I've made this more accurate one, and if you're a believer in the Albertan claims then I'd appreciate if you used it instead:

Nice and in fitting with the map projection, see?

--Faustgg2 (talk) 00:31, 4 March 2026 (UTC)

Berkenhout

@Stefan2: that is an interesting point. You are correct that Berkenhout does not use the genus name Rattus at all in this work, and classifies the species as Mus norvegicus instead. This both contradicts the text currently int he article (Berkenhout gave the brown rat the binomial name Rattus norvegicus, believing it had migrated to England from Norwegian ships in 1728) and the universal usage of Rattus norvegicus (Berkenhout, 1769) in all databases. I have no idea what to make of that. In the absence of a clear explanation, maybe pointing out this mismatch in the text would be useful. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 12:02, 15 June 2024 (UTC)

I didn't notice that the name was also discussed in the text. From what I can see, Berkenhout can't have introduced the name Rattus norvegicus as he didn't use that name, as currently stated in the text. He may have introduced the norvegicus part. --Stefan2 (talk) 14:33, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

Maximum Length

19" is not unusual, I have measured a wild rat at 19". Today the Guardian reported a 22" rat caught on Tyneside.

[] 80.5.7.242 (talk) 15:47, 4 August 2025 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: BIOL 4095 3.0 Applied Plant Ecology

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 7 January 2026 and 30 April 2026. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): BlueMorphoButterflies (article contribs). Peer reviewers: VIOP2.

— Assignment last updated by Cactusorchid (talk) 23:16, 9 May 2026 (UTC)

Diet

The diet section lists foods produced by humans, such as scrambled eggs and cooked corn, citing a source about what brown rats eat from human garbage but without properly contextualising it. It would be more appropriate to begin the section by describing the natural diet of the rats, and to describe the diet of rats that eat from human garbage only after explicitely establishing that context. Moreover, the list of "least liked foods" is, I assume, only the least liked of those included in the cited study, which, again, is not properly contextualised. ~2026-44504-2 (talk) 00:19, 2 April 2026 (UTC)