American water shrew records in Minnesota run overwhelmingly through GBIF, 80 entries against just 3 from iNaturalist, consistent with a semi-aquatic specialist that hunts along cold, clear streams and is documented mostly through trapping rather than sightings. Itasca State Park, at the Mississippi’s headwaters, and Chippewa National Forest anchor the record.
With so few total records, the sparse seasonality classification reflects genuine data scarcity rather than a documented gap in the shrew’s activity. NatureServe ranks the species S5, Secure, in Minnesota despite the thin photographic record, a case where a real population goes largely undocumented because the habitat it favors, small headwater streams, gets little observer traffic.
Full species profile
