March 1995
"Pussel," my six-year-old son Rocky calls his kitty. We found her by the woods near our house his first day of kindergarten last September, and we bought a food and water dish, a bed, and a litter box for her. Rocky and Pussel tear around the house together, he sees to her needs, and she sleeps beside him in his bed. They speak a secret language.
We rent an old, ramshackle house located within the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore surrounded by natural areas. Wildlife is everywhere. We see as much inside our old house as outdoors.
Pussel has become a great mouser. No more poison or snap traps. She has dispatched about twenty field mice and a half dozen squirrels inside the house this winter. Pussel likes to bring her kill to me. Maybe it is her way of thanking me for rescuing her.
Monday was the vernal equinox, the first day of spring. Spring peepers and western chorus frogs have been singing for two weeks in the wetlands just down the road. Skunk cabbage, the first wildflower, has emerged. Hawks will soon come on southerly winds and observers have already seen record sandhill crane flights in the region. I listen to the dawn bird chorus each day and note the new arrivals.
Monday night, Pussel stalked and chased something around the living room and playroom. I caught a glimpse as it dashed by. The gestalt was wrong for a mouse and I knew it was something else.
This non-mouse had a too-long-snout and a too-short-tail. It seemed to sense rather than see Pussel, and it chattered loudly when cornered. Definitely not a mouse.
I ran to the porch and grabbed a large aquarium net taped to a mop handle that I use for pond studies. Maybe Pussel would drive it to me. Pussel, the animal and I played "cat-and-mouse" for two hours. She got bored and went up to Rocky's bed.
I sat down to read, net nearby. The non-mouse meandered across the living room floor. I chased it, snatched it up in the net, and put it into a deep box.
The animal was in shock, breathing rapidly, and unresponsive. Sometimes the exertion and fright of a chase will kill a small animal. I did not want to stress the animal further, so I quickly measured and examined it:
The body measured 4-inches, the tail, 3/4-inch. Five toes on fore- and hind-feet, no apparent ears, eyes barely visible, thick, dun-colored fur, and a short, hairy tail.
I pulled "Mammals of the Great Lakes," "Mammals of the Indiana Dunes" and a Peterson's mammal field guide off the shelf. God bless all scientists, naturalists and watchers who have gone before. In five minutes, I had it. My non-mouse had a name; it was a northern short-tailed shrew.
I uncovered the box and looked in at "Shortie." This shrew is a common resident of the Indiana Dunes and feeds on insects, grubs, worms, snails, and other invertebrates. It is a distant relative of moles. The northern short-tailed shrew makes its own burrows or uses those of other animals. But it is also active above ground.
Shortie was coming around, looking for a way out of the box. I wanted to show it to Rocky in the morning. If I left the box out, Pussel would surely get the shrew before morning.
So, by the light of the moon, I released Shortie, one of the most common mammals of the Dunes, into some leaf litter under a shrub.
Strange how many common Dunes species are seldom seen, I thought.
Copyright 1995, Bud Polk