LI. 



Marsh-shrew, Water-shrew, or Black-and-white 

 Shrew. 



Neosorex palustris (Richardson). 



(Gr. neos, new; L. sorex, a shrew; L. palustris, of marshes.) 



Sorex palustris RiCH., 1828, Zool. Journ., Ill, No. 12, p. 517. 

 Neosorex palustris Elliot, 1 901, Syn. Mam. N. A., Field 



Mus., Zool. Sen, Pub. 45, Vol. II, p. 378. 

 Type Locality. — Region between Hudson Bay and Rocky 



Mountains. 



French Canadian, la Musaraigne de Marais. 



The genus Neosorex (Baird, 1857) is much like Sorex, but 

 differs in having greater size, different colour pattern, and 

 peculiar feet; these are adapted for swimming, having beau- 

 tiful white fringes of bristle-like hair; they are, indeed, much 

 like the feet of a Muskrat in miniature. 



Its teeth differ somewhat from those of Sorex (see Fig. 

 251 — 4); but many consider the differences to be only sub- 

 generic. It is easily distinguished from the other Long-tailed 

 Shrews in Manitoba by its much greater size and black-and- 

 white style of colouration. 



Total length, 6| inches (155 mm.); tail, 2 A inches 

 (65 mm.); hind-foot, | inch (19 mm.). 



All above dusky brown, or very dark gray, sprinkled with 

 hoary; below white, silvery in some lights; dorsal and ventral 

 areas rather sharply defined from snout to tail root; tail, 

 bicoloured, blackish above and all around near tip, white 

 below. 



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