Optimizing the capture of neophobic rice field rats in lowland Asian rice ecosystems.

Background: Trapping is a key method for monitoring small mammals and is also one of a number of methods recommended under an ecologically-based rodent management program to control rodent pest populations. Live-traps are widely used globally for studying small mammal populations. In Asia where rodents are major pests of rice, single capture traps typically provide low trap success.

Revisiting the Pneumocystis host specificity paradigm and transmission ecology in wild Southeast Asian rodents.

Pneumocystis fungi are opportunistic parasites of mammalian lungs whose evolution, ecology and host specificity in natural host populations remain poorly understood and controversial. Using an extensive collection of 731 lung samples from 27 rodent species sampled in five Southeast Asian countries, and nested PCR amplification of mitochondrial and nuclear genes, we investigated the host specificity and genetic structure of Pneumocystis lineages infecting wild rodents. We also identified the rodent species playing a central role in the transmission of these parasites using network analysis and centrality measurement and we characterized the environmental conditions allowing Pneumocystis infection in Southeast Asia using generalized linear mixed models.

Rodent management and cereal production in Asia: Balancing food security and conservation.

Rodents present a major problem for food security in Asia where smallholder farming families are particularly vulnerable. We review here recent developments in the biology and management of rodent pests in cereal cropping systems in Asia. The past decade has seen a strong focus on ecologically-based rodent management (EBRM), its adoption in field studies significantly increased rice yields (6-15%) and income (>15%) in seven Asian countries.

The stadium effect: rodent damage patterns in rice fields explored using giving-up densities.

Rodents are globally important pre-harvest pests of rice. In Southeast Asia, rodent damage to growing rice crops is commonly concentrated towards the center of rice fields, away from the field edge, resulting in a clear pattern known as the "stadium effect." To further understand this behavior of rodent pests and to develop recommendations for future research and management, we examined the relation between giving-up densities (GUDs) and damage patterns.