INSECTIVORA 



(Neosorex palnstris) "The stomachs and intestines of those taken are 

 usually found to contain particles of insects and small animals so well 

 masticated that the species are not easily recognized." 



Shrews and moles "get numerous ants, wireworms, cutworms and 

 white grubs, and undoubtedly do more good than harm. The short- 

 tailed shrew has proved to be one of the principal enemies of the larch 

 sawfly, and in New r Brunswick it has been ascertained that 40 per cent 

 of the cocoons are destroyed by this shrew." 2 * It is quite fond of land 

 snails, one having eaten 130 Polygyras in two months, and 15 per cent 

 of the food of the specimens under observation by Shull was snails, 

 40 per cent meadow mice and 5 per cent earthworms. 27 Others took 

 crickets and moths and "ate with avidity anything of an animal nature, 

 including pieces of salty chipped beef." 28 A captive gray shrew (Notio- 

 sorex craivfordi) was very fond of mealworms, from 4 to 7 large ones 

 constituting a day's ration, but it refused a salamander and earth- 

 worms. 29 La Valette listed the water shrew (Crossopus, or Neomys). 

 .with the enemies of fishes 30 and Haack says that "shrew-mice" (wasser- 

 spitzmausen) in brooks are "well-known enemies of the eggs and young 

 of fish." 31 It is very doubtful whether any shrews do much real damage 

 to either fishes or their eggs. 



One long-tailed shrew, of three in close confinement, killed and ate 

 the other two in eight hours. 32 A short-tailed shrew in captivity is re- 

 ported to have killed and partly eaten a two- foot water snake. 33 Others 

 are said to have killed salamanders. 34 Dusky shrews (Sorex obscunis 

 obscurus) in captivity ate grasshoppers, stinkbugs and other insects, 

 earthworms and watermelon rinds. 35 



The following table, combining data furnished by Hamilton, 36 shows 



M McAtee, The role of vertebrates in the control of insect pests, Ann. Kept. 

 Smithsonian Inst. for 1925, pp. 416. 



27 Shull, Habits of the short-tailed shrew, Blarina brevicauda (Say), Amer. 

 Naturalist, XLI, 495-522, 1907. Howell, N. Amer. Fauna, No. 45, p. 21, 1921. Hamil- 

 ton, Journ. Mammalogy, xi, 27-30, 33, 1930. Clench, Nautilus, xxxix, 28, 1925. Hahn, 

 33rd Ann. Kept. Indiana Dept. Geol. and Nat. Hist, (for 1908), p. 601. Babcock, 

 Science, XL, 526-530, 1914. 



28 Klugh, Notes on habits of Blarina brevicauda, Journ. Mammalogy, n, 35, 1921. 



29 Dixon, Notes on the life history of the gray shrew, Journ. Mammalogy, v, 

 1-6, 1924. 



"La Valette, The enemies of fish, Kept. U. S. Fish Comm. for 1878, pp. 500-516. 



81 Haack, Trapping kingfishers, rodents and other enemies of trout, Bull. U. S. 

 Fish. Comm., rv, 375-376, 1884. 



32 Hahn, 33rd Ann. Kept. Indiana Dept. Geol. and Nat. Res., p. 606, 1908 (1909), 

 quoting Merriam. 



83 Cope, On the habits of a species of Blarina, Amer. Nat., vn, 490-491, 1873. 



84 Hamilton, Journ. Mammalogy, xi, 33, 1930. 



85 Miller, A note on the dusky shrew in captivity, Journ. Mammalogy, xi, 311- 

 312. 1930. 



88 Hamilton, The food of the Soricidae, Journ. Mammalogy, xi, 26-39, 1930. 



