Eurasian pygmy shrew

The Eurasian pygmy shrew (Sorex minutus), often known simply as the pygmy shrew, is a widespread shrew of the northern Palearctic.

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Italian. (June 2022) Click [show] for important translation instructions.

View a machine-translated version of the Italian article.
Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia.
Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article.
You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Italian Wikipedia article at [[:it:Sorex minutus]]; see its history for attribution.
You may also add the template {{Translated|it|Sorex minutus}} to the talk page.
For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

Quick Facts Conservation status, Scientific classification ...

Eurasian pygmy shrew^[1] Temporal range: Early Middle Pleistocene–Recent PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N ↓

Conservation status
Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)^[2]
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Eulipotyphla
Family:	Soricidae
Genus:	Sorex
Species:	S. minutus
Binomial name
*Sorex minutus* Linnaeus, 1766

Eurasian pygmy shrew range

Description

It measures about 5 cm (2.0 in) in length, not including the 3.5 cm (1.4 in) tail, and has an average weight of 4 g (0.14 oz).The hair on the back is blackish with shades ranging from reddish to purplish, very dense and shiny: the belly, throat, jaw, periocular area and lower part of the tail are contrasted whitish. The muzzle and legs are covered with sparse white hair (vibrissae in the muzzle ), while the skin is flesh colored: the ears are small and half hidden by the hair, they are dark flesh colored and shaped like a semicircle. In this species the head is larger in proportion to the body than in other shrews. It may be confused with Eurasian least shrew and the Etruscan shrew.

Remove ads

Behaviour

Eurasian pygmy shrews are solitary animals, active throughout the day and night and inhabiting areas of dense vegetation across a broad elevation range.^[3] It lives off seeds, small insects and other invertebrates.^[4] They use the burrows or tunnels of other rodents to live in, alone they burrow under tree stumps.They have many predators. The whole life is spent on a few hundred square metres where they establish trackways.The Eurasian pygmy shrew has one of the highest metabolic rates of any animal; to maintain homeostasis, it must eat every two hours.^[5]^[6] Due to this, it eats up to 125% of its body weight (about four grams) each day.^[7] They are active for 24 hours per day in very short periods interspersed with sleep (say, 15 minutes of activity followed by 15 minutes of sleep).

Remove ads

Breeding

The breeding season lasts from April through to August. Females usually produce between two and eight young per litter and care for the young in an underground nest. Since the gestation period is just over three weeks, they can have up to five litters in one year, though the life span of a pygmy shrew is a little over 15 months.^[4]

Eurasian pygmy shrew

Description

Behaviour

Breeding

References

External links

Wikiwand - on