22 E. LÖNNBERG, CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE FAUNA OF SOUTH GEORGIA. 



catching some specimens which were preserved in alcohol and carried home, and 

 then the correctness of K. A. Andersson's views was confirmed. 



Sörling reports on his endeavours in finding the rat as follows. »Not before 

 the winter had arrived eould I possibly have any hope of suceess in trapping the 

 mysterious rat. The first snow fell in the midcUe of April. I then found the first 

 foot-prints of råts on the southern side of the Moraine Fjord, about three kilometres 

 from the factory. These tracks looked as the accompanying sketch shews and appea- 



red to belong to four different specimens. I then 



put ont steel-traps and other traps at different places 



. & q ^ where the råts had passed. For bait I used raw fish, 



o <_ o <^ potatoes, fried pork, carrots. pieces of äpples etc. The 



following morning I went to search the traps, but 

 Tracks of tl/loutt Georgia rat. without result. And so it went on, to my great dis- 



gust, for some weeks, although, as I found from new 

 footprints in the snow, the råts had passed within a metre from some traps without 

 visiting them. Continuous snow-storms for a couple of weeks then hindered any 

 trapping. 



During moonlight nights I watched and tried to get an opportunity to shoot 

 a rat but I was not lucky enough even to see any. It is certain, however, that 

 they are on the move during the nights or early mornings and they stroll about 

 round the tussock-hills but all tracks I followed ended among the stone-heaps on the 

 sides of the rocky hills or at the foot of the mountains. The tracks often lead down 

 to the shore where the råts appeared to seek food.» 



Finally Sörling succeeded in catching two råts among the tussock-grass and 

 a third was caught by a dog rather far from the factory. 



The tracks of råts first found could not have been made by animals introdu- 

 ced by the vessels used by the whaling-expedition itself for several reasons. Firstly 

 the tracks that were first observed were found very far from the station as at the 

 Moraine Fjord, below Mount Duse on the Leopard-point etc. Secondly the ships 

 were, to begin with, anchored at a great distance from land, and not before the middle 

 of May a vessel coming from Buenos Aires with coal, provisions and empty barrels 

 was hauled up to a kind of wharf at the shore. This vessel was also the first on 

 which råts had been observed. From this time, however, the tracks of råts around 

 the station greatly increased so that it became rather uncertain if a track was made 

 by a native or introduced rat. Sörling believes, however, that the native rat as 

 a rule did not leave any track of its tail as the recently introduced råts did. He 

 had namely followed tracks in the snow in places very far from the station for seve- 

 ral kilometres and found the tracks to be similar all the way, except when the tracks 

 went up a steep hill, for then there were tracks left of the tail. The snow was then 

 so deep that there were impressions made by the body for every jump. 



Whether this difference of the tracks holds good, or not, it is quite certain that 

 South Georgia was inhabited by a rat before any had been introduced by Captain 

 Larsen's ships. It is, however, more difficult to decide, with full certain ty, if the 



