Alaska holds the single largest share of records for this shrew anywhere in the country, far outnumbering every other state. Reports concentrate in the Matanuska-Susitna Valley’s mixed forest, with further records reaching the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the tundra of the North Slope. Few small mammals turn up across such a wide slice of Alaska’s habitat, from coastal spruce forest to high Arctic tundra.
Its metabolism runs so fast that it can’t afford to stop hunting for long. It hunts nearly around the clock, working through beetles, worms, spiders, and insect larvae, and it keeps hunting straight through winter in the narrow gap between snow and ground instead of hibernating like many small mammals its size.
Records here spike sharply in July and August, which lines up with when small-mammal trapping surveys typically run in Alaska. That’s a survey-timing pattern more than a sign the shrew goes quiet the rest of the year.
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