by Dixie Thomason

Created on: June 04, 2010

Shrews are small animals, the pygmy shrew is the smallest mammal. Given their small size, they are quite aggressive. There are 376 species of shrew, dispensed all over the world apart from Australasia and the polar regions. They are classified as white and red toothed shrews. Included in the red toothed shrews are the water shrew, common shrew and the 34 North American shrew varieties. North American shrews include pygmy, masked and the water shrew. There is also the short tail, which is reported to have a venomous bite, smoky shrew which has a tail that grows larger during mating season and the mighty short tailed shrew. All red toothed shrews have similar features they have small ears and eyes and a long rounded off nose which is covered in bristles. Shrews are gray or dark brown with off white bellies.

The shrew lives alone inside of tunnels in the grass, or in surface tunnels and is rarely seen, discovered only by its shrill squeak. Shrews alternatively eat and rest in three hour intervals. They are more active during the three hour stints that occur during the night. Shrews have short life spans, for most red toothed shrews, a fifteen month old shrew is considered to be very old.

There are several interesting legends and old wives tales involving shrews. One such legend says that a shrew can not encounter a human and live. To this end, lots of people have said to have seen a shrew that was coming toward them suddenly drop at their feet. However, these shrews may have been very old. Also, it is possible that some of them may have died from “cold starvation”.

Since shrews are such small animals, they quickly lose body heat by radiation. This heat can be replaced by food only, this is the reason they must eat every three hours, more often in cooler temperatures. If a shrew goes longer than a few hours without eating it will die. The majority of sightings of a shrew “dropping dead” occur in the early morning hours. This is when cold starvation is the most likely to happen.

Shrews prefer a diet of insects however, they will eat any tiny animal which is weaker than themselves snails and worms for example. They also require seed or cereal of some sort. This was found out by a man named Peter Crowcroft while studying them in captivity. He discovered that they stayed healthy as long as they were fed some seed or cereal daily. A shrew will eat ¾ of their own body weight every day.

In the period of time between spring and fall, mature female shrews will give birth at least twice to a litter of four to eight babies after a gestation of anywhere from thirteen to twenty one days. Newborn shrews weigh only 1/100 of an ounce. The baby shrew's eyes open from eighteen to twenty one days and just two days later it will be weaned. Most likely, there is a large infant death rate among shrews. Prey birds, especially owls, as well as foxes and weasels use them for food.

Learn more about this author, Dixie Thomason.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.