page_title: Fauna of New Guinea
section_title: Placental mammals
hierarchical_section_title: Fauna of New Guinea / Mammals / Placental mammals
caption_attribution_description: Melonycteris melanops
context_page_description: The fauna of New Guinea comprises a large number of species of mammals, reptiles, birds, fish, invertebrates and amphibians.
  As the world's largest and highest tropical island, New Guinea occupies less than 0.5% of world's land surface, yet supports a high percentage of global biodiversity. Approximately 4,624 vertebrate species inhabit the island of New Guinea and its surrounding waters, which constitutes about 8% of the recognized world vertebrates. This ranges from an estimated 4% of the world's lizards and mammals, to about 10% of the world's fish species.
  The numbers of global and New Guinea invertebrate species are poorly known, and thus an accurate comparison is difficult. Butterflies are the best known invertebrate group, and are represented in New Guinea by about 735 species, which is about 4.2% of the world total of 17,500 species.
context_section_description: The rodents are solely represented by the family Muridae, and within this family, 29 genera are native to New Guinea. They are believed to have migrated to New Guinea during two periods. The first group, called the old endemics form part of an ancient clade including other old endemics from Australia and the Philippines and likely migrated to New Guinea during the Late Miocene or Early Pliocene. The second group includes a number of species of the genus Rattus. These are believed to have moved to New Guinea later. Most New Guinea species form a monophyletic group with some Moluccan species, which is most closely related to the Australian group (one species of which also occurs on New Guinea) and to the R. xanthurus group of Sulawesi.
  The old endemics have undergone an adaptive radiation, which produced such distinctive forms as the small, shrew-like Pseudohydromys, the amphibious Hydromys, tree mice of the genus Chiruromys, and several genera of giant rats, of which Mallomys is the largest. This genus contains the largest rat found in New Guinea, the grey black-eared giant rat (Mallomys aroaensis); males can reach a length of 41 centimetres (16.1 in) from snout to vent.
  The bats of New Guinea are a very diverse group, comprising six families, and 29 genera. The six families are: Pteropodidae, Emballonuridae, Hipposideridae, Rhinolophidae, Vespertilionidae and Molossidae. Bats migrated to New Guinea on many occasions, with many species being shared with Australia, the Sunda Islands and even mainland Asia. The megabats, or Megachiropterans, of New Guinea are highly adapted, and many are endemic to New Guinea and surrounding islands. While most megabats are herbivorous, and eat fruit, nectar and flowers, some species within New Guinea have adapted to also eat insects whilst in flight; an ecological niche usually filled by microbats. Some species also forage on the ground, an adaptation not seen in areas with large predators.
  The microbats show much less endemism than the megabats. Only one genus and a few species are endemic to New Guinea and surrounding islands; this suggests a much later migration to New Guinea.
  The colonisation of New Guinea by humans (Homo sapiens) occurred at least 40,000 years ago. Since their original colonisation, many mammals have been introduced both by accident, and on purpose. The wild boar (Sus scrofa) was introduced to New Guinea at least 6,000 years ago, though may have been introduced 12,000 years ago. It is abundant throughout the island, and more common in areas where humans grow sweet potato as their primary food source. The wild boar is a large forager, and disturbs the forest floor whilst looking for food. This disturbance may have an effect on the native flora and fauna.
  The domestic dog (Canis familiaris) was introduced to New Guinea about 2,000 years ago. There is also an endemic wild dog, the New Guinea singing dog, Canis lupus hallstromi, that is closely related to the Australian dingo. It arrived on the island at least 6,000 years ago. Its common name comes from the way these dogs harmonize during chorus howls. The New Guinea singing dogs live in the remote mountains, above human habitation level, and are the largest land predator.
  Many murid species have been introduced to New Guinea. These include: the Polynesian rat (Rattus exulans), the Himalayan field rat (Rattus nitidus), the black rat (Rattus rattus), the rice field rat (Rattus argentiventer), the brown rat (Rattus norvegicus) and the house mouse (Mus musculus). Most of these have not caused much damage, and most have only established in human settlements. R. nitidus and R. argentiventer have very limited distributions on the island. The house mouse is the most widespread of the introduced murids, and is found in settlements and grassland. It is the only introduced murid to reach the central region of Telefomin.
  Three species of deer have been introduced to New Guinea. The rusa deer (Cervus timorensis) is the most common, and well established. It is found throughout the north and south of New Guinea. It is commonly hunted f
caption: The black-bellied fruit bat is native to the Bismarck Archipelago of Papua New Guinea.
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