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Cooper's Lemming Mouse
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- Length
- 4.80 inches.
- Description
- Upper front teeth grooved, tail very short (.70 inch). Colour sepia brown, with many black hairs interspersed, some individuals with a slight admixture of buff or reddish-brown hairs, others somewhat grayer. Below plumbeous, generally with whitish tips to the hair, ears very short, overtopped by the hair, mammae six.
- Range
- Southern New England and Michigan to Indiana and Virginia and in the mountains to North Carolina.
- Range
- Replaces the common species in Dismal Swamp, Virginia.
- Range
- Northern New England, Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick. The northern representative of Cooper's lemming mouse.
- Range
- Labrador (Fort Chimo and Rigoulette).
- Range
- Base of Mt. Washington, Fabyans. N. H
In external appearance the lemming mouse bears such a close resemblance to the common field or meadow mouse, with which it frequently associates, that it would readily be passed by. Without considering its minute anatomy it will be sufficient to call attention to its grooved front teeth by which it can always be recognized, its rather coarser hair and very short tail. The lemming mouse was first described by Professor Baird in 1857 and for years after its discovery it was regarded as excessively rare. Modern methods of trapping, however, have brought to light many specimens and we have learned that it is pretty generally distributed throughout our Northern States wherever conditions suitable for its requirements are to be found.
In connection with its rediscovery in our Eastern States it is interesting to know that science is indebted to that indefatigable mouse hunter, the barn owl, for the knowledge of the occurrence of the lemming mouse in several localities, the skulls having been found in the pellets of hair and bones which the owls had ejected about their nests.
Cold sphagnum bogs seem to be the favourite haunts of these little animals in the East, where they use the ample runways of the meadow mice which form an intricate network of passages beneath the damp moss and among the roots of the grass and rushes. In winter the sphagnum freezes up, forming a solid roof to the runways, but upon breaking into them abundant signs of life are to be seen and a trap set in such a situation is pretty sure to catch one or other of the several little animals which make these spots their home. For beside the lemming mouse and meadow mouse we find here also the red-backed mouse and the little shrew.
In Indiana Mr. A. W. Butler finds the lemming mice frequenting stony hillside pastures, while their nests are placed under stumps or logs.
Their food seems to consist of roots and tender shoots of grasses and rushes, though from the nature of their retreats it is practically impossible to gain much information as to their habits. Even when we are fortunate enough to catch a glimpse of one of the little animals it is usually merely a flash of brown fur, as he disappears with lightning speed along one of his passage ways.
Varieties and Related Species of Lemming Mice
1. Cooper's Lemming Mouse. Synaptomys cooperi Baird. Range and description as above.
2. Dismal Swamp Lemming Mouse. Synaptomys cooperi helaletes (Merriam). Similar, but with larger head and more massive skull.
3. Northern Lemming Mouse. Synaptomys fatuus Bangs. Smaller and darker, with narrower skull.
4. True's Lemming Mouse. Synaptomys innuitus True. Resembles Cooper's lemming mouse in general appearance, but has a very different skull, with much narrower, paler, coloured incisor teeth. Female with eight mammae.
5. Preble's Lemming Mouse. Synaptomys sphagnicola Preble. Similar to the last, but larger (5.25 inches long).