insectivora
- Sorex Shrew • The common long-tailed shrew, Sorex araneus, ranges through moist areas of
Europe and Asia.
• Body is slender, about 7.5 cm long, with dense fur, short legs, sharply pointed
sensitive, bewhiskered muzzle or snout and small weak eyes.
• First pair of incisors are very long, lower canines are absent, all teeth are red.
• They live in burrows but come out on surface at night.
• The Indian genus is Soriculus commonly known as ‘chuchunder‘.
- Talpa Mole • Moles are also known as ‘chuchunder‘. They differ from shrews in being larger
and in having enormous shoulder girdle and muscles so that head and trunk
seem to merge.
• They are also efficient burrowers.
• Body is thick, cylindrical and covered by a soft velvety fur.
- Erinaceus Hedgehog • Hedgehogs range throughout Europe, Africa and Asia.
• They have a small globular body, pointed snout, stumpy tail and short legs.
• Skin is covered with short barbless spines, intermingled with hair, except on the
belly to protect themselves.
• When disturbed, they roll up into a ball for protection, so that the spines project
outward like pins in a pincushion. They are omnivorous creatures.
• Common Indian name is ‘jhau chuha‘.
Chiroptera
- Pteropus Frugivorous
bat
• These are the fruit-eating bats found in the Old World tropics and sub-tropics,
including India.
• They are called the flying foxes because of fox-like head, long snout and large
eyes.
• Some of them are the largest of bats with a body 30 cm in length and a
wingspread of 1.5 metres.
- Rhinolophus Insectivorous
bat
• They are small to medium in size, with small eyes, comparatively short snout and
without claw on second finger.
• Most have special flaps in front of their large ears, used for navigation or echo-
location.
- Desmodus Vampire bat • Tree vampire bats occur in tropics and are famous because of their sanguivorous
habit.
• They often feed on fresh blood of sleeping domestic animals, even human
beings.
• Their incisors are razor-sharp with which they slit the skin of the prey, where hair
and feathers are scanty, and the oozing blood is lapped up.
• Pinna are large with a lobe called tragus.
Edentata
- Bradypus Sloth • Sloths of tropical America are distinctly arboreal and slow-moving creatures.
• They have short rounded heads, inconspicuous ears, forward-looking eyes and
no tails.
• The hands and feet bear 2 or 3 long and curved claws by which the animal
hangs upside down from tree branches, eating, sleeping and moving in that
position.
• They feed mainly on fruits and leaves.
