pack rat
noun
a large, bushy-tailed rodent, Neotoma cinerea, of North America, noted for carrying off small articles to store in its nest.
pack rat
1 American
Or
packrat
noun
-
Also called wood rat, trade rat. a large, bushy-tailed rodent, Neotoma cinerea, of North America, noted for carrying off small articles to store in its nest.
-
Informal. a person who saves things that are not needed or used but that may have personal or other value.
-
Informal. an old prospector or guide.
pack-rat
2
American
[pak-rat]
/ ˈpækˌræt /
Or
packrat
verb (used with object)
Informal.
pack-ratted,
pack-ratting
pack rat
British
noun
Etymology
Origin of pack rat1
First recorded in 1840–50
Origin of pack-rat2
First recorded in 1870–75
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Fortunately for avid bibliophiles, Harper Lee was an inveterate pack rat.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 21, 2025
A known pack rat, Trump travels often, throws papers and news clips in cardboard boxes and sometimes instructs that boxes be brought along when he travels.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 18, 2023
“My father was the biggest pack rat there ever was,” he said.
From New York Times ● Sep. 15, 2022
He is a pack rat, and kept the original packaging.
From The New Yorker ● Jul. 22, 2019
He was a regular pack rat, though smaller.
From "Secrets at Sea" by Richard Peck
Instead, most of it is a mélange of the pack-rat artist’s correspondence, clippings, snapshots, short reminiscences from friends and former teachers, gallery announcements, brief essays, exhibition photographs and more.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 16, 2018
Brian Prather’s scenic design illustrates Dr. Westheimer’s admitted pack-rat tendencies.
From New York Times ● Jun. 15, 2013
Ms. Haws said the archive benefited from the pack-rat mentality of its founders: the players themselves, who governed the Philharmonic for its first 75 years and kept meticulous records.
From New York Times ● Feb. 3, 2011
That was demonstrated by hydrologist Fred Phillips of the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, who checked an ancient pack-rat midden for evidence of cosmic-ray bombardment of the earth.
From Time Magazine Archive
There was music that evening in the Bunker Hill mansion but Denver Russell sat sulking in his cave with no company but an inquisitive pack-rat.
From Silver and Gold A Story of Luck and Love in a Western Mining Camp by Dane Coolidge
Kurzweil has preserved fifty boxes of his father’s effects, everything from his letters and photographs to his electric bills, all pack-ratted into a storage facility in Newton, Massachusetts.
From The New Yorker ● Mar. 27, 2017
Mr. Showalter doesn’t hang out in the house much, but the pack-ratting motif allows him and his co-writer, Laura Terruso, to pad the story with some family storming and stressing.
From New York Times ● Mar. 10, 2016
But viewers have never seen pack-ratting through the lens of "Thy Father's Chair," a new documentary that makes hoarding as urgent as global warming and as impossible to turn away from as Al Gore's beard.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 7, 2016
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