WATER SHREWS 



resembles, in miniature, the water vole. Both 

 creatures have a greyish look when they are swiftly 

 moving under water. I was often puzzled by this 

 appearance of the vole until I noticed what Bell, 

 in his " British Quadrupeds," wrote of the shrew's 

 appearance under water, and what is true of one 

 no doubt is true of the other. Its black velvety 

 coat, he wrote, is " beautifully silvered with the 

 innumerable bubbles of air that cover it when sub- 

 merged." Bell noticed that when this shrew rose 

 to the surface after a dive its fur seemed quite dry, 

 like the plumage of duck or grebe. 



The water shrew is not hard to approach and 

 watch in a spot like this, as its sense neither of 

 sight nor of sound is acute at least, it is not long- 

 sighted. In spring and summer it is full of frolic. 

 Dovaston, who first named the water shrew as an 

 English animal, long ago gave a nice description 

 of its ordinary movements. " It dived and swam 

 with great agility and freedom, repeatedly gliding 

 from the bank under water, and disappearing under 

 the mass of the leaves at the bottom. It very 

 shortly returned and entered the bank, occasionally 

 putting its long, sharp nose out of the water, and 

 paddling close to the edge." The long tail of the 

 water shrew was likened by Bell to a rudder. The 

 water vole has a comparatively short tail, though 

 one might suppose it needed a good rudder as much 

 as the shrew ; it takes longer trips in the water, 

 and for safety has to be very deft in steering and 

 turning. If Dovaston was the first to write of the 



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