Sorex alpinus Schinz 1837
Creators: name: Mittermeier, Russell A.
name: Wilson, Don E.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2018
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Chordata
Mammalia
Soricomorpha
Soricidae
Sorex
Sorex alpinus

description: 1. Alpine Shrew <i>Sorex alpinus</i> <b>French:</b> Musaraigne alpine / <b>German:</b> Alpenspitzmaus / <b>Spanish:</b> Musarana alpina <b>Taxonomy.</b> Sorex alpinus Schinz, 1837, St. Gotthard Pass, Canton Uri, Switzerland. Structural specifics of nDNA and mtDNA indicate that S. alpinus lacks related species and is an ancient relict species. Sorex mirabilis, which is another relict Palearctic species, is the closest to S. alpinus by several morphological characteristics including structure of glans penis. Sorex alpinus is isolated in a separate subgenus, Homalurus named by E. Schulze in 1890, but some researchers question this. Three subspecies recognized. <b>Subspecies and Distribution.</b> S.a.alpinusSchinz,1837—SEFrance,Switzerland,NItaly,C&amp;SGermany,SWCzechRepublic,Austria,Slovenia,NWHungary,Croatia,BosniaandHerzegovina,Serbia,Montenegro,andNAlbania. S.a.hercynicusG.S.Miller,1909—NGermany(Harz);possiblyextinct. S. a. tatricus Kratochvil &amp; Rosicky, 1952 — N &amp; E Czech Republic, Slovakia, S Poland, W Ukraine, NE Hungary, and Romania. <b>Descriptive notes.</b> Head—body 62-77 mm, tail 60-75 mm, hindfoot 12-17 mm; weight 5-5—11-5 g (immatures 5-5-7-7 g). The Alpine Shrew is physically similar to the Common Shrew (S. araneus) and the Eurasian Pygmy Shrew (S. minutus), but its long tail and darker fur make it distinguishable from them. Pelage color is monotonous from dark gray, sometimes with weak brown shade, to ash-black; color of dorsal, lateral, and ventral sides of body is practically the same. Tail length is 100% of head-body length, and tail is covered with short hard hairs that do not form brush at tip oftail. Tail is sharply bicolored, color of dorsum above and on sides and almost white below. Back surface of paws is very light, contrasting sharply with dark color of body. In sexually mature individuals,tail losesits hairs and becomes practically naked. Dental formula for all species of Sorex is 1 3/2,C1/0,P3/1,M 3/3 (x2) = 32. Chromosomal complementof the Alpine Shrew has 2n = 56 (more rarely 54 or 58) and FN = 68, with 10 metacentric and 44 acrocentric autosomes. X-chromosomeis large submetacentric, and Y-chromosome is small acrocentric. <b>Habitat.</b> Usually highlands with sparse tree and shrub vegetation but also forested slopes with stony places orat least separately lying stones used as shelters. The Alpine Shrew is less common in cluttered forests, where it uses trunks offallen trees and other woody debris to hide. It sometimes inhabits man-made stonewalls, up to 1m high, built to demarcate fields. It only occurs in habitats with high or moderate humidity, but xeromorphic biotopes are avoided even in the presence of stony places. <b>Food and Feeding.</b> Diet of the Alpine Shrew includes various invertebrates, dominated by species of relatively large sizes. Earthworms, mollusks, and myriapods are consumed as food more often than insects. Insects such as carabid beetles, earwigs, and dipteran larvae are also eaten. <b>Breeding.</b> Breeding of the Alpine Shrew occurs in May—October. Overwintering individuals are usually involved in reproduction and then die, being incapable of surviving another winter. Female young-of-the-year sometimes reproduce. Litters usually have 4-7 young. Meanlitter size was 4-7 young in Austria and 5-8 young in Czech Republic. <b>Activity patterns.</b> Daily activity pattern has not been specially studied in the Alpine Shrew, but it probably is multiphasic, like in other species of Sorex. Relatively short sleeping periods alternate with activity periods; the latter are longer at night than in the daytime. The Alpine Shrew is terrestrial and well adapted for dwelling among stones. Its tail is very long. Captive individuals have been observed climbing while using their tail as support, allowing them to climb higher than other species of Sorex. <b>Movements, Home range and Social organization.</b> Territorial behavior of the Alpine Shrew has not been studied, but indirect evidence suggests it is territorial and solitary. <b>Status and Conservation.</b> Classified as Near Threatened on The IUCN Red List. The Alpine Shrew is a European endemic and relict species, a conclusion supported by lack of genetically related forms among existing shrews. Strict habitat selectivity leads to fragmentation ofits distribution (e.g. Dinaric Alpine region is isolated from Tatra Carpathian region). Isolation primarily involves marginal populations and facilitates their extinction. Isolated populations in the Pyrenees (Spain) and a population of the Harz (Germany) are presumably extinct. Last records of Pyrenean and Harz populations date back to the beginning and the second one-half of the 20" century, respectively. <b>Bibliography.</b> Benes (1970), Cabrera (1914), Dolgov (1985), Klenovéek et al. (2013), Kuvikova (1986), Lapini (2009), Murariu &amp; Benedek (2005), Schulze (1890), Spitzenberger (1978, 1990a), Starcova et al. (2016), Zaitsev et al. (2014), Zima et al. (1998).
description: Published as part of <i>Russell A. Mittermeier &amp; Don E. Wilson, 2018, Soricidae, pp. 332-551 in Handbook of the Mammals of the World – Volume 8 Insectivores, Sloths and Colugos, Barcelona :Lynx Edicions</i> on page 395, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.6870843