Feed Preference Tests of Carbohydrate, Protein, and Rodenticide to Tree Rat, House Rat, and Rice Field Rat

Abstract

Rats are wild animals that coexistence with humans. The losses caused by these rats are damage to house building, agriculture, and plantation. Knowledge of the feed as bait and lure is very important in rat control, particulary with rodenticides and traps. The aim of this research was to find out feed preference to three species of rats and effect of feed availabili-ty toward rodenticide consumption. Tree rat (Rattus tiomanicus), house rat (R. tanezumi), and rice field rat (R. argentiventer) were tested with four stages i.e. (a) type of carbohydrate sources, (b) type of protein sources, (c) combination of carbohydrate and protein, and (d) carbohydrate, protein, and rodenticide. The method used was choice test. Carbohydrate tested were corn, rice, unhulled rice (grain), and oat. Protein were cricket, frog, fish, and mouse. Rodenticide (brodifacoum 0.005%) was tested to the rat. Each feed and rodenticide are weighed before and after testing to analyze the preference of rats. The data analyzed using SAS program for windows version 9.0, a further test with Duncan multiple range test with α = 5% and 1%. Unhulled rice (grain) and cricket were the kind of feed that most preferred or highest palatable by test animals. The existence of feed causes the lower consumption of brodifacoum rodenticide by three species of rats.