Townsend’s vole belongs to Washington’s wet side, and the record shows it plainly. Of 200 records, 85 come from King County, and the San Juan Islands National Monument leads the named places with 19, a map of damp meadows, marsh edges, and grassy lowlands west of the Cascades.
One of the biggest voles in the West
Townsend’s vole is a large, dark vole of wet ground, far heavier than the meadow mice that share its range, and it travels well-worn runways through dense sedge and grass. It feeds on stems, leaves, and bulbs, swims readily when its marshy ground floods, and in some years irrupts to high densities before food limits and predators pull numbers back down. Records from Olympic National Park and the Woodard Bay conservation area on south Puget Sound fit that lowland, moisture-loving habit.
A summer crest in a year-round rodent
Voles stay active through every season, breeding from spring into fall, and Washington’s records crest in July before settling back through autumn. The winter counts never vanish, matching an animal that tunnels under snow and through matted grass rather than sleeping the season away.
Status in Washington
NatureServe ranks Townsend’s vole S5, Secure, in Washington, and the species is native to the state. USGS NAS does not list it as nonindigenous here.
Full species profile
