Shrew is a tiny one: habitat and interesting facts

The shrew is a tiny mammal of the family of insectivorous shrews, similar to a small mouse. The name of the tiny animal has received from a word "brown" as the tops of a teeth at creation really differ this unusual color.

Habitat

You can meet the shrew almost everywhere, often more than three species of these animals live simultaneously on the same terrain. For example, in the Moscow region, there are as many as six varieties of shrews: shrew, ordinary and small, medium, tiny, equal-toothed and kutora.

Ravnozubye are found on the backwaters and river banks, as well as the common curlew, are great lovers of dampness. Medium and tiny shrews are among the rarest species that prefer coniferous, taiga forests. Small shrew and ordinary inhabit the open areas - in the steppe, meadows, in the woodlands.

Shrew is unpretentious in terms of comfortable living conditions, but the abundance of food all year round for it is a necessary condition. Moving to significant distances in search of food for a small animal is not possible, and it is impossible to survive without food for more than 3-4 hours.

Characteristic

A tiny shrew is one of the smallest insectivorous creatures in Russia and Europe. The size of an adult with the tail is 6-7 cm, and the weight does not exceed five grams. The description of the shrew is more accurate to begin with a silky soft-coffee color on the back, turning into a light fluff on the abdomen. The tail, which is slightly longer than half the body of the shrew, is also two-colored. The paws are not covered with fur.

In summer, the color of the beast dims slightly, in the winter it becomes more saturated. The ears of the animal are small, but the hearing is developed very well, like touch and flair. The outstretched head ends with a nose-proboscis with a pinning vibrissa (long mustache).

Shrews do not live more than a year and a half, and about a fifth of this short life lasts their breeding season. Unlike most animals, the gestation period of the female is not strictly fixed. The cubs will appear healthy after 18, and after 28 days. The average number of babies for one litter is about five, but sometimes it is 8. During their life, an adult female brings from 1 to 2 litters.

Lifestyle

The high vitality of a tiny shrew is due to the constant search for food. At least 70 times during the day the animal stops for a short time - 10-15-minute sleep. Then the fuss is renewed.

To maintain normal life, a tiny shrew must eat a quantity of food twice the weight of its body. In the warm season, intensive searches for food are carried out throughout the territory, which the animal is able to cover with short dashes: on trees, in the soil. In winter, the search is carried exclusively to the soil, and under the snow the animal is oriented as well as in the open space.

Shrews eagerly eat all living things, which are smaller than their own size, but in the cold season they do not disdain the lives of similar and other large animals in the cold season. In a particularly hungry time, adult shrews quietly include in their diet young puppies.

Interesting Facts

In the winter, shrews do not fall into a hibernation, but it is almost impossible to see them on the surface of the snow cover. Because of the excessively catchy coloring, animals leave the snow-covered areas only in situations of extreme necessity and when they are very hungry. Foresight, this could be called superfluous, since a strong specific smell of an animal discourages predators of hunting, if not for owls - the only representatives of predatory fauna who are not so fond of.

Despite its small growth, the shrew is the carrier of a huge number of different parasites and ticks. Insects settle in the thick fur of an animal and often cause the death of a shrew.

Another interesting fact - a tiny shrew, at any time of the year, maintains the highest body temperature in comparison with all mammals of the planet - from 40 ^° C.

Most of all animals of this species live in the taiga - an average of 350-400 shrews per 1 ha, but in other areas of their habitat existence of tiny creatures is under threat. In the Murmansk region, the tiny shrew is listed in the Red Book.