Now something else to worry about!

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the woods, I’ve discovered a terrifying new animal lurking outside my door here in New York.  Its formal name is Blarina Brevicauda, but around the ‘hood, it goes by the name of the Northern Short Tailed Shrew. Common from the Midwest to the eastern seaboard and on up into parts of Canada, this shrew is apparently named for (what else?) its short tail. (Brevicauda is actually mashed up Latin for short (brevi) tail (cauda). It’s only about four to five inches long, but don’t let Shorty's diminutive size fool you. The Northern Short Tailed Shrew (let’s call him Brevi for short), is the only POISONOUS mammal in North America.

You got it right! Poisonous! This little critter actually has its own venomous saliva that it can squirt out from a gland in its lower jaw when it bites its prey. So when biting a Meadow Vole, Brevi’s favorite lunch, his squirt of saliva actually either paralyzes it, so he can eat it later if he wants and he won’t be eating a long-dead lunch, or kills it outright. Sucks for the Voles (or Field Mice as we know them) but until someone builds refrigeration for shrews, it works.

The toxin is strong enough to kill animals up to a bit larger in size that the shrew itself. And it can give humans who try to handle these poison fur-balls a painful bite. Not like anybody would go out of their way to pick one up.

These little monsters are not nice neighbors. Very territorial. Scientists put one of them into a cage that another shrew was already living in. The new shrew was dead in four hours. But in spite of their venomous nature, these shrews are great lovers. When mating, they’ll do it up to twenty times in a 24 hour period. It takes six times just to induce ovulation. They also have a massive appetite for food. They eat up to three times their own body weight in a day. This is especially impressive in that they are only actively hunting about 15 percent of the day, usually around dusk. The rest of the time is sack-time in their underground nests.

Quite frankly, I’m glad to hear they aren’t cruising around too much. Can you imagine? Poisonous mice? What’s worse than that?

I’ll be indoors if you need me.