Critter Science
The Science of Animals
Most people hear the word mouse and immediately think of a pest that invades your house and more specifically your pantry at night, leaving little pellets of poop and stains of urine wherever they travel. Mice are so much more than a pest. They are beneficial critters to our ecosystem and provide
With around 155 known species in North America alone, the vole is a common critter that can be found in meadows, savannas, forests, dense grasslands, prairies, swamps, arctic tundra, home gardens, and farmland. They can be found from the Alaskan tundra all the way down to Mexico
The arctic hare lives in the extremely harsh environment of the North American tundra and Greenland. The Arctic hare is well-suited to conditions typically seen in the tundra regions, plateaus, and treeless coasts of this area. They are specifically adapted to cold weather and frozen
There are 35 known species of gopher that are found from Northern to Central America. Gophers prefer coastal areas, woodlands, prairies, and mountain regions. Gophers, in general, are considered pests due to the substantial amount of damage they can cause to fields, gardens,
The packrat, aka wood rat, trade rat, and pack rat (separate words) are called this due to their propensity to collect a variety of objects, trinkets, and bits of material to deposit in, in building of, their nests. They particularly love bright, small, shiny objects that they will
There are around 30 known species of lemming that can be found in the northern parts of Canada, Alaska, Europe and Asia; near the Arctic Circle. Lemmings live in Arctic tundra, woodlands, and taiga. Their overall population varies from year to year, depending on the available
Native to South America, the coypu, aka the nutria is now an invasive species, due to their rapid rate of reproduction and the fact that they were exported to Europe, Africa, Asia and North America for their luxurious fur. Well, some escaped and that was all she wrote! They can
The guinea pig isn’t actually a pig at all. They are rodents. Guinea pigs don’t have a tail and that they have 4 toes on their front feet and 3 on their back feet. The Incas domesticated guinea pigs over 3,000 years ago, and the Spanish brought them back from the Andes mountains to
There are 11 known species of agouti found in Central and South America; and only in Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina. Agoutis live in tropical rainforests, savannas, scrublands, grasslands, and evergreen lowland forests. Being incredibly shy creatures, they are very
Looking like a rabbit and a kangaroo mated, we have the springhare. These critters live in the semiarid steppes and dry savannas of Kenya and Tanzania as well as in Southwestern Africa. They can travel up to 18 miles in search of food!