Postnatal growth and development in Sorex unguiculatus.

Abstract

The postnatal growth period is of central interest for an understanding of the life histories of altricial mammals. Among the soricine shrews (Soricidae, Insectivora), however, there is only limited information available concerning the postnatal development of a few species (Crowcroft 1957; Harper 1977; Churchfield 1990; Innes 1994). In the long-clawed shrew Sorex unguiculatus Dobson, for example, there have been no reports of direct observations of postnatal growth and development although Okhotina (1984), Inoue (1990), and Nesterenko (1999) estimated the length of the postnatal period of this species, inferring from indirect observations. In the present paper, we describe our direct observations of the growth and development throughout the postnatal growth period of captive S. unguiculatus.