Microtus agrestis, Eating, Three, Four, & Five

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Well, as promised, the final batch.  I saved the best (in my opinion) for last, so I hope you enjoy them and enjoyed meeting our little friend of the woodland floor.

You can find more information on the short-tailed vole here:

Wikipedia
ARKive
The Mammal Society
USGS

Microtus agrestis, Failures

Before we move on to the final batch of Microtus agrestis pictures, I just want to show again the difficulty in photographing it (noobs gotta learn someway).  The trick was always to get the focus on the right spot - the vole - but finding that sweet spot as it was darting around, or even eating, was surprisingly hard.  Nevertheless, a few of those failures turned out to be kinda cool.

Note the tiny green leaf in the corner of the third image!

Microtus agrestis, Eating, One & Two

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Download original.

Eventually, we gave it some of our food, and it happily started chomping on it.

Microtus agrestis, Foraging, Two

I'm kinda surprised that its feet are so big, even it's partly an illusion because the toes are spread apart.  Considering the diverse terrain it travels over, though, this revelation does make sense.

I also love the fact that its poking its nose through the leafy crevasses, just because of the cute factor.  Did I mention the cute factor, yet?  I did?  Oh.

Microtus agrestis, Foraging, One

Finally, we get a good look.  Talk about cute!  And what a star for putting up with the prodding camera as long as it did.

The last picture is what made me see that it was a short-tailed vole (Microtus agrestis).  When I found a similar-looking species, I thought I'd finally found the right name, but then I saw the tail and realised it was actually the wrong one, as mine had a long tail.  Then, to confirm this, I checked that image, and --

[markkermode]Wait a minute![/markkermode]

Good thing I took a picture.  My memory isn't as reliable.

Microtus agrestis, Blurred

Our little friend was quick and shifty.  Getting good shots, as you can see here, was tricky at times.   Fortunately, there were moments where it settled down for long enough to get a still.

(*self-congratulatory pat on the back* for eventually finding the exact species.  Good thing I didn't settle on tree shrew as I originally intended.)