User:Danac0508/Crawford's gray shrew

Description
Since this shrew has a very high rate of metabolism, it will eat up to 75% of its body weight every day, and occasionally its full body weight. This can be dangerous since it can overheat the animal.

Characteristics
The shrew spends energy at very fast pace. When resting, the average shrew's heart rate is at about 1000 bps (beats per minute). In its respiratory rate, that is 800 breaths per minute.

The breeding season of the Crawford's gray shrew ranges from the spring to the fall to year-round. About three weeks after mating, the female shrew will give birth to three to five offspring.

Water Loss
This species also conserves water by being nocturnal, unlike other shrews, which hunt day and night to avoid starvation. To keep from losing any water from its victims, it will bite off the legs and then crush the prey's head so as not to kill it but to keep it fresh and unable to move.

Lifespan
Even with all of these adaptations to help it survive in the harsh environment of the desert, Crawford gray shrew only lives for a relatively short period (about a year or so in the wild).

As the shrew feeds on insects and intakes more food than their body mass within a short period, when deprived of food, the gray shrew will starve to death in hours.