Elliot's Short-tailed Shrew
From Freepedia
The Elliots short-tailed shrews are are a specimen of shrew found only in Texas.
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Description
An elliots short tailed shrew is a shrew that is nearly identical in appearance to the Southern short tailed shrew both tiny,slate grey to brownish coloured shrews with fairly short tails and no visible ears.
Distribution
Only found in Aransas,Montague and Bastrop counties.Fossils of this shrew are known in cave sites throughout the Hill county.
Habits
In Aransas county,these Shrews inhabit mottes of live oak trees on sandy soils,where they excavate their diminutive burrows.In Bastrop county,they have been collected in Pitfall traps placed in grassy vegetation with an overstory of Pine.Specimens from Montague county were obtained in a pitfall trap set in grassy vegetation several meters from some post oak trees.They sometimes burrow extensively under leaf litter,logs,and deeply in the soil. The shrew is slightly venomous and may occasionally pray on animals larger than itself like mice.More frequently consumed food items include insects,arthropods,snakes,salamanders and some worms. Females produce 2 to 3 litters or four to six young every year.Its reproductive habits are similar to the Southern short tailed shrew.It has a lifespan of only 2 years. Family:Blarina Hylophaga
Habitat in Texas
Found mainly in forests.These forests could be coniferous and deciduous,but on the Great Plains it is most common in Riparian situations with cottonwoods and in rank grasses and weeds alongside the road.
