BioSample

The Stoat (known as the short-tailed weasel in North America) is one of the smallest true carnivores. It is naturally distributed across most of the Holarctic, including most of northern Europe, UK, Ireland, Canada and the northern USA. Stoats were introduced to New Zealand in the 1880s and 1890s, primarily founded from stock caught in Lincolnshire, in northern England. Stoats are now an invasive species in New Zealand where they threaten many indigenous birds. This specimen was collected from the wild in native forest in the Coromandel, New Zealand by Tim Cruikshank and Andrew Veale to generate a chromosome level reference assembly as part of the G10K-VGP project, in association with the Biological Heritage Science Challenge and Predator Free 2050.