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Harvest mouse - MICROMYS MINUTUS
Class: Animals with Milk Glands (Mammalia)
The Name "Mouse": "Mouse" comes from the Old English word
"mus," for the animal.
Location: Europe and central Asia.
Habitat: Terrestrial. Fields of grain (temporarily), terrain with tall grass.
Description: The coat is reddish-yellow on the back, and white on the underside. The eyes are of average size and the ears are round. The hind feet have five toes, the front feet only four. Length of head and body is about three inches, and the tail is three additional inches. It weighs about a quarter of an ounce.
Behavior: The harvest mouse feeds on seeds, grain, and sometimes insects. It is active by day and by night. It climbs nimbly up and down the stalks of tall grass, where it builds its round, birdlike nest. It uses its tail, which is partly prehensile, to help it climb. When building its nest it uses leaves and stalks, which it tears off with its teeth. For the winter it builds either a larger nest situated higher up the stalk or a nest under the ground. It does not hibernate, but survives the winter on food it has stored. The sound it emits is shrill, almost like a shriek.
Reproduction: Gestation lasts about three weeks, and there can be several litters a year, each with three to seven young which nurse for about 18 days.
Note: The most common and generalized rats and mice of the Old World (and introduced elsewhere) belong to this subfamily of Murinae of the Muridae family. “Murine” means mouse, or mouselike.
Go to the Rodents Page to learn more about all the gnawing animals.
Or go to the Mouse Index to study other
mice.
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