Shrew

Shrews Temporal range: Eocene to present
A southern short-tailed shrew
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Infraclass:	Eutheria
Order:	Eulipotyphla
Suborder:	Soricomorpha
Family:	Soricidae
Genus
Sorex

Shrews are small mammals which look rather like mice. They were classified in the old Insectivora, but that is no longer used. Now they are classified in the family Soricidae, suborder Soricomorpha.^[1]

True shrews are not to be confused with West Indies shrews, treeshrews, otter shrews, or elephant shrews, which belong to different families or orders.

Although its external appearance is generally that of a long-nosed mouse, a shrew is not a rodent, as mice are. In fact it is related to moles. Shrews have sharp, spike-like teeth, not the familiar gnawing front incisor teeth of rodents.

Shrews are distributed almost worldwide. Of the major tropical and temperate land masses, only New Guinea, Australia, and New Zealand do not have any native shrews. In South America, shrews are relatively recent immigrants and are present only in the northern Andes. In terms of species diversity, the shrew family is the fourth most successful mammal family.

1. ↑ Hutterer, Rainer (2005). Don E. Wilson; DeeAnn M. Reeder (eds.). Mammal Species of the World (3rd ed.). Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 223–300. ISBN 978-0-8018-8221-0.