title: Interspecific competitive interactions between Rattus norvegicus and R. rattus

authors: Foster, Stacey Patricia

subjects: Rattus rattus

abstract: Interspecific competition is observed when one species experiences reduced survivorship or fecundity, due to another controlling access to resources either through being superior at harvesting a shared resource (exploitation competition), or physically preventing the other species from accessing the resource, either through territory defence, or aggressive behaviour (interference competition).
The aim of this project was to investigate the idea that a balance of exploitation competition and interference competition working together contributes to governing the current distribution of ship rats and Norway rats in New Zealand.
The ship rat is the most abundant species, being widespread in native forest, while the Norway rat is largely restricted to farm buildings, rubbish tips, riparian sites and wharves.
Chapter Two aimed to test the null hypothesis that there are no differences in the ability of the two species to harvest resources above the ground in native forest. An artificial forest was created with stands of various heights, representing small trees; with inter connecting ropes of various widths to represent branches rats might encounter in the forest. Individual rats were placed in the artificial forest and their activity recorded during the night. As expected, ship rats were significantly faster climbing up and down all the stands, as well as being faster traversing the various ropes. They also utilised the artificial forest much more than Norway rats. This ability of the ship rat to utilise this habitat may give them advantages in exploitation competition.
Chapter Three aimed to test which species is superior at inference competition, when they meet on the ground. This was done using two methods: (1) inter- and intra- specific staged encounters in a small box, with a rat at each end, separated by a partition, with the rats behaviour remotely recorded, and (2) placement of the scent of the opposite species or the actual animal in a self contained cage somewhere within the artificial forest, which was used in the previous chapter. Ship rats appeared to be disturbed by the presence of Norway rats in the artificial forest, but they ignored displays of aggressive behaviour exhibited by the Norway rats during the staged encounters.
Chapter Four describes an attempt to validate the results found in Chapters Two and Three in the wild, under natural conditions. A 480 metre long trap line, with 17 trap stations, 30 metres apart was placed on Rahui Island, Lake Waikareiti. Each station consisted of two Victor snap traps with covers, one on the ground and one 2.0 metres above the ground on a platform, with seven trapping nights. Ship rats were trapped on the forest floor and 2.0 metres above the ground, while only one Norway rat was trapped, on the forest floor.
Chapter Five summarises the results from the previous chapters and also outlines possible avenues for future research in this area. The results described in this thesis are consistent with the prediction that the distribution of both species in New Zealand is governed by shifting advantages of exploitation competition and interference competition, mediated by habitat.

text: Interspecific competitive interactions between Rattus norvegicus and R. rattus Interspecific competition is observed when one species experiences reduced survivorship or fecundity, due to another controlling access to resources either through being superior at harvesting a shared resource (exploitation competition), or physically preventing the other species from accessing the resource, either through territory defence, or aggressive behaviour (interference competition).
The aim of this project was to investigate the idea that a balance of exploitation competition and interference competition working together contributes to governing the current distribution of ship rats and Norway rats in New Zealand.
The ship rat is the most abundant species, being widespread in native forest, while the Norway rat is largely restricted to farm buildings, rubbish tips, riparian sites and wharves.
Chapter Two aimed to test the null hypothesis that there are no differences in the ability of the two species to harvest resources above the ground in native forest. An artificial forest was created with stands of various heights, representing small trees; with inter connecting ropes of various widths to represent branches rats might encounter in the forest. Individual rats were placed in the artificial forest and their activity recorded during the night. As expected, ship rats were significantly faster climbing up and down all the stands, as well as being faster traversing the various ropes. They also utilised the artificial forest much more than Norway rats. This ability of the ship rat to utilise this habitat may give them advantages in exploitation competition.
Chapter Three aimed to test which species is superior at inference competition, when they meet on the ground. This was done using two methods: (1) inter- and intra- specific staged encounters in a small box, with a rat at each end, separated by a partition, with the rats behaviour remotely recorded, and (2) placement of the scent of the opposite species or the actual animal in a self contained cage somewhere within the artificial forest, which was used in the previous chapter. Ship rats appeared to be disturbed by the presence of Norway rats in the artificial forest, but they ignored displays of aggressive behaviour exhibited by the Norway rats during the staged encounters.
Chapter Four describes an attempt to validate the results found in Chapters Two and Three in the wild, under natural conditions. A 480 metre long trap line, with 17 trap stations, 30 metres apart was placed on Rahui Island, Lake Waikareiti. Each station consisted of two Victor snap traps with covers, one on the ground and one 2.0 metres above the ground on a platform, with seven trapping nights. Ship rats were trapped on the forest floor and 2.0 metres above the ground, while only one Norway rat was trapped, on the forest floor.
Chapter Five summarises the results from the previous chapters and also outlines possible avenues for future research in this area. The results described in this thesis are consistent with the prediction that the distribution of both species in New Zealand is governed by shifting advantages of exploitation competition and interference competition, mediated by habitat.

year: 2010

title: Tanzania and Uganda: Contrasting similarities

authors: Zirker, Daniel

abstract: Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya provide striking institutional comparisons and contrasts in both ethno-political dynamics and civil-military relations, although both Tanzania and Uganda, in what were arguably their most formative periods at least, displayed what Ali Mazrui described as "the most acute manifestation[s] of the crisis of identity," while employing ethno-politics to resist the remnants of their colonial dependency. ¹ Both manifested forms of invented military ethnic identities, or quasi-ethnicities, at one or another junctures, although under very different circumstances, and for very different purposes. After the infamous 1971 Idi Amin coup, Uganda reverted to government by an ethnic, or quasi-ethnic, "Muslim club,"² the Nubian "martial race," or "warrior class," that had originally assisted in the establishment of the British colony of Uganda, prompting Mazrui to comment in 1975 that "tribalism in Africa is unlikely to disappear within a single lifetime. " ³ And yet tribalism seems largely to have done precisely this in neighboring Tanzania except, perhaps, for the emergence of religious differences in the 1990s as potentially divisive and even catastrophic factors.

text: Tanzania and Uganda: Contrasting similarities Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya provide striking institutional comparisons and contrasts in both ethno-political dynamics and civil-military relations, although both Tanzania and Uganda, in what were arguably their most formative periods at least, displayed what Ali Mazrui described as "the most acute manifestation[s] of the crisis of identity," while employing ethno-politics to resist the remnants of their colonial dependency. ¹ Both manifested forms of invented military ethnic identities, or quasi-ethnicities, at one or another junctures, although under very different circumstances, and for very different purposes. After the infamous 1971 Idi Amin coup, Uganda reverted to government by an ethnic, or quasi-ethnic, "Muslim club,"² the Nubian "martial race," or "warrior class," that had originally assisted in the establishment of the British colony of Uganda, prompting Mazrui to comment in 1975 that "tribalism in Africa is unlikely to disappear within a single lifetime. " ³ And yet tribalism seems largely to have done precisely this in neighboring Tanzania except, perhaps, for the emergence of religious differences in the 1990s as potentially divisive and even catastrophic factors.

year: 2015

title: Ka Māpuna: Towards a rangatiratanga framework for the governance of waterways

authors: Martin, Betsan

abstract: Rangatiratanga is thenavigational courseforthis research, the aspiration that guides a frameworkfor thegovernance which, in respect ofwaterways and Te Taiao secures mauri, ecosystem health, and water for domestic and commercial use. Rangatiratanga encompasses mana whakahaeredecision-making throughout all relevantgovernance systems. In respect of resource governance, this needs to be achieved through mana whenua authorities and co-governance institutions and procedures.

text: Ka Māpuna: Towards a rangatiratanga framework for the governance of waterways Rangatiratanga is thenavigational courseforthis research, the aspiration that guides a frameworkfor thegovernance which, in respect ofwaterways and Te Taiao secures mauri, ecosystem health, and water for domestic and commercial use. Rangatiratanga encompasses mana whakahaeredecision-making throughout all relevantgovernance systems. In respect of resource governance, this needs to be achieved through mana whenua authorities and co-governance institutions and procedures.

year: 2021