James Russell (ecologist)
James C. Russell is a New Zealand ecologist. He has a PhD from the University of Auckland.
Russell is most widely known for his research on Norway rats in New Zealand. One of the rats he studied swam over 400 metres between two Hauraki Gulf islands, breaking the swimming distance record for rats. The intentions of the rat are believed to have been amorous. The rat, known as Razza, was featured in Nature, and later in a children's book by Witi Ihimaera.
In 2012, Russell was awarded the New Zealand Prime Minister's MacDiarmid Emerging Scientist Prize, worth NZD 200,000, for his work using DNA fingerprinting of rats and statistical modelling to address conservation problems.
He writes a blog for National Geographic on island conservation.
