CLIMBING OF THE WATER SHREW. 
21 
In many cases, I observed that, in the process, the stone was 
split into its two halves. 
I have placed specimens of these berries also in the Club’s 
Museum. 
There can be no doubt, I think, that in the case of these 
haws the work was done not by Voles (as in the case of the 
rose-hips mentioned above), but by the much-larger Field Mice. 
CLIMBING OF THE WATER SHREW. 
By FRED. J. STUBBS. 
The Water Shrew will sometimes w r ander far from water ; 
and, where a stream has been bordered by steep rocks, I have 
found that this agile animal is a ready climber. On the Pennines, 
I have often seen Water Shrews climbing over rocks ; and 
both Common and Lesser Shrews exist in steep rocky woods 
and fields where climbing must be almost a necessity of existence. 
That the little animal should be capable of climbing trees 
is, however, new to me. On the 2nd June 1910, near Rainham, 
I saw a Water Shrew leave the bank of the stream and run up 
the trunk of a pollard willow, a yard or so in front of me. 
It clung to the bark like a squirrel, with body pressed flat and 
the four legs widely spread ; and it moved head downwards 
as easily and as rapidly as in the opposite posture. The eager 
little being v'as evidently searching for insects. In a few 
seconds, after being about six feet from the earth, it descended 
and vanished in the dense herbage. This took place about mid- 
day. 
[Mr. Stubbs’ note is of much interest ; for the climbing 
powers of the Water Shrew appear hitherto to have passed 
almost unobserved (or, at any rate, unrecorded). I have 
searched the literature .relating to the animal with some care ; 
and. so far as I can find, none of the leading British writers thereon 
(neither Bell, Millais, nor Barrett-Hamilton) refer to its climbing 
powers. The only definite reference thereto which I have been 
able to discover is that of Mr. T. G. Rope, of Blaxhall, Suffolk, 
who says (Zoologist, 1900, p. 477), of an individual which he 
kept for a few' hours in a mouse-cage, that ‘‘ Its climbing pow'ers 
were considerable, for it not only ascended easily the upright 
wires of its cage, but even made its way along the top, clinging 
back downwards to the wires/’— Ed.] 
