Glide on the shrew train
August 22, 2013 6:58 PM   Subscribe

"Young shrews are occasionally observed following their mother in a ‘caravan’. Each shrew grasps the base of the tail of the preceding shrew so that the mother runs along with a line of young trailing behind. This behaviour is often associated with disturbance of the nest and may also be used to encourage the young to explore their environment." - The Mammal Society
posted by moonmilk (22 comments total) 18 users marked this as a favorite
 
*manly squeal*
posted by turbid dahlia at 7:08 PM on August 22, 2013 [1 favorite]


I've seen poor quality gifs of this floating around labeled as everything from mice or rats to some kind of horrific new super mutant creature. I'm incredibly relieved to find out they are shrews and this is normal.
posted by Ad hominem at 7:18 PM on August 22, 2013


oh my actual god

there is an animated gif of this


And then incidentally like it was no big woop they threw in a kittencam. Like they just consume fatal doses of adorable on a regular basis, nbd.
posted by louche mustachio at 7:20 PM on August 22, 2013 [2 favorites]


When we were living In The Woods in a rented duplex in Middlanowheah, RI, we had adopted a hyper-active Jack-Russel/Beagle mix. It feared nothing or no-one... save the shrew that charged out of its hole shrieking its battle-challenge by the oak tree our dog sort of wanted to poop near, but could never find the courage to eat/step-on its guardian in order to do so. Tinier than a mouse, with a =loud= angry cry, it charged pretty much anything that got too close to its burrow. You only knew it was there by the rustling of the grass and the loud shrill, which is apparently the technical term for a shrew sound.
posted by Slap*Happy at 7:20 PM on August 22, 2013 [5 favorites]


The trailing of the shrew
posted by Flashman at 7:21 PM on August 22, 2013 [3 favorites]


The Shrewman Centipede
posted by Ouisch at 7:22 PM on August 22, 2013 [5 favorites]


I totally imagine them making choo-choo noises.



I also was reminded of Our Wonderful Nature
posted by louche mustachio at 7:31 PM on August 22, 2013 [2 favorites]


Wow shrews are tiny.
posted by Ad hominem at 7:35 PM on August 22, 2013 [3 favorites]


All aboard the shrew-shrew train.
posted by jayb3369 at 7:46 PM on August 22, 2013 [9 favorites]


Do they have a theme song?
posted by The Underpants Monster at 7:50 PM on August 22, 2013


This makes me feel ok. I just learned that elephants using their trunks to hold the tails of the elephant in front of them while walking in a line isn't natural and that it is a behavior trained by humans, which was pretty depressing. At least we have the shrews.
posted by Literaryhero at 8:52 PM on August 22, 2013


This video is insane and kind of blew my mind and then made me seriously consider googling "WTF is a shrew".
posted by vakker at 9:03 PM on August 22, 2013 [1 favorite]


When we were living In The Woods in a rented duplex in Middlanowheah, RI, we had adopted a hyper-active Jack-Russel/Beagle mix. It feared nothing or no-one... save the shrew that charged out of its hole shrieking its battle-challenge by the oak tree our dog sort of wanted to poop near, but could never find the courage to eat/step-on its guardian in order to do so.

I don't ordinarily think of either of those breeds as models of self-restraint and good sense, but I might have to make an exception for your dog:
Among mammals, the short-tailed shrew B. brevicauda (Say, 1923) is well known to produce a potent venom in its saliva, which is toxic to mammals, such as mice, voles, rabbits, and cats (1, 3). Human accounts of bites from Blarina describe a local burning sensation around the tooth puncture marks and subsequent swelling (10). In general, soricine shrews consume large amounts of food to meet their high metabolic demands (11). Although they belong to the order Insectivora, B. brevicauda do not eat insects and invertebrates exclusively but also vertebrates, even larger than themselves, such as murid rodents and frogs (1, 11–13). Therefore, this shrew species may use its venom to paralyze and catch larger preys.
posted by jamjam at 9:49 PM on August 22, 2013


Hmmm?... Literaryhero we still have the Elephant Shrew, I don’t know if they use their little trunks to connect up in a caravan.
But it would really make my day if they did. Can you imagine a long caravan of The Golden rumped elephant screw and the Checkered elephant screw
juxtaposed in a grand circus performance.
posted by quazichimp at 1:47 AM on August 23, 2013


The Shrewmanmom Centipede
posted by Faint of Butt at 4:17 AM on August 23, 2013 [3 favorites]


Anyone ever try taming one of these?
posted by orme at 5:13 AM on August 23, 2013 [2 favorites]


One of our cats once encountered a shrew in our backyard. My husband and I came outside and heard it shrieking--it was INCREDIBLY loud and we thought it was a bird at first. Our cat was backed up with a "WTF??" look on her face. We shooed kitty away and my husband put on thick gloves to "save" the shrew. Good thing he did, because it promptly bit him when he picked it up. We moved it across the athletic field behind our house and it immediately trucked away straight back toward our yard.
posted by dlugoczaj at 7:18 AM on August 23, 2013


Elephant shrews are not actually shrews. They are, even more bizarrely, a close(ish) relative of elephants.
posted by Scientist at 9:36 AM on August 23, 2013 [1 favorite]


That can't possibly be true, can it? And yet it'shtrew!
posted by moonmilk at 10:11 AM on August 23, 2013 [2 favorites]


I thought everyone knew all about this. Shrews are clever.

The the Christmas Island Shrew pretended to beextinct.
posted by Lesser Shrew at 10:40 AM on August 23, 2013


"There were three endemic mammals living on Christmas Island at the time of colonisation; the Christmas Island Fruit Bat; the Christmas Island Insect Bat; and the Christmas Island Shrew Ground Bat"
posted by moonmilk at 11:37 AM on August 23, 2013


Shrews will fuck you up.
posted by srboisvert at 2:12 PM on August 23, 2013


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