page_title: Asian house shrew
section_title: Ecology and behaviour
hierarchical_section_title: Asian house shrew / Ecology and behaviour
caption_attribution_description: Suncus murinus
context_page_description: The Asian house shrew is a shrew species native to South and Southeast Asia that has been listed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List since 2008 because of its large population and wide distribution. It has been introduced in several West Asian and East African countries.
  It is considered an invasive species and implicated in the demise of several island lizard species.
  It is also called house shrew, grey musk shrew, Asian musk shrew or Indian musk shrew.
  In India, it is called chuchunder and is mentioned in Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book by the name of chuchundra as a nocturnal inhabitant of Indian houses. However, Kipling's mistaken use of the name 'musk rat' has led to confusion with the unrelated North American muskrat, and the latter species, not found in India, was illustrated in the Jungle Book.
context_section_description: The Asian house shrew is a voracious insectivore with little resistance to starvation. It is active during the night, spending the day in a burrow or hiding place in human habitations. They breed throughout the year, with each female averaging two litters per year. The gestation period is one month. One to eight young are born per litter, usually three young, in a nest made by both of the parents, wherein the young stay until they are nearly adult. It starts breeding when it is around one year old.
  Studies on this shrew have suggested its suitability for use in laboratory studies of reproduction and nutrition.
  It is widespread and found in all habitats, including deserts and human habitations. The habitat of this species is normally near human settlement, specifically near the house. Some also live on the ground in leaf litter and grass. It has been recorded up to 2825 m above sea level near Darjeeling, West Bengal, but only to up to 300 m in Taiwan.
  The house shrew has a habit of moving quickly along the edges of the walls when it enters human habitations. As it runs it makes a chattering sound which resembles the sound of jingling money, which has earned them the name ”money shrew” in China. When alarmed, the house shrew makes an ear-piercing, high-pitched shriek, resembling the sound of nails scraping a chalkboard or a metal fork scraping glass, which repels house cats. Predators also leave the house shrew alone because of its musky smell and even when they catch one by mistake they will rarely eat it.
  Another remarkable habit of this shrew (shared with the white-toothed shrews of Europe) is that it forms a ”caravan” with its young, that is, the young line up behind the mother and follow it while she walks. The first young will hold on to the mother's fur with its teeth, and the subsequent young will do the same with the sibling in front of it.
  It is often mistaken for a rat or mouse and killed as vermin. In general it is beneficial to humans because its diet consists mostly of harmful insects such as cockroaches, and even house mice. It can therefore be considered as a biological pesticide. Unlike rats, population levels of house shrews remain low. Despite its use as an insect control, it can be unpopular due to the strong odour of its droppings, which it may deposit in human dwellings behind kitchen cupboards, etc. It can also take to eating human food such as meat in kitchens, or dog or cat food. It is known to occasionally kill young chicks, making it unpopular with farmers, although rats probably kill more chicks, and more quickly. The way it is said to attack chicks, by first biting a tendon, immobilizing it and then killing and eating it, could indicate that it has a venomous bite that paralyses, as at least two other shrews species have (i.e. the Eurasian water shrew and the Northern short-tailed shrew).
caption: Coloured pencil drawing by Kawahara Keiga, 1823-1829
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