Mammalogy experts have recently found a one-and-a-half foot long giant rat in the Solomon Islands which can crack coconuts with its bare teeth.
They can weigh up to two pounds and is one of the largest rat species living in the world. Scientists took 80 years to discover the giant rat, Vika, and they found only one of the kind.
Mammalogist Dr Tyrone Lavery from the Field Museum in Chicago discovered the rat. According to a Daily Mail report, he said: “The new species, Uromys Vika, is pretty spectacular - it's a big, giant rat. It's the first rat discovered in 80 years from Solomons, and it's not like people haven't been trying - it was just so hard to find.”
The brown-haired rat has wide hind feet and curved claws. From nose to tail it measures up to a foot and a half and its hairless tail is at least as long as its body. It was found nesting high up in the kapuchu trees of Vangunu in the Solomon Islands.
Experts have been suspecting the existence of the rat for at least two decades as the native villagers of the island shared stories of the rat multiple times.
The find was published in the Journal of Mammalogy and is giving rise to fear for the future of the Solomon Islands, east of Papua New Guinea.
Interestingly half the mammals found on the island could not be found anywhere else on Earth.
According to Dr Lavery, the rat was in such a stage that it might never have been discovered if they had not discovered it now. It was found in the only place left with a forest that has not been logged. He also said finding additional support for the Zaira Conservation Area on Vangunu where the rat lives has become urgent.
Thursday, June 04, 2026
