Muridae

Wood mouse ( Apodemus sylvaticus )

The long-tailed mice ( Muridae ) form a family of mice -like ( Muroidea ) and as such belong to the rodents ( Rodentia ). Although many species are cosmopolitan, partly independent, partly could spread with the help of transport all over the world, the substantial majority of the species is limited to small areas of distribution and comes with the people barely in contact. Due to their enormous adaptability and the property that they are synanthropic, one finds the cosmopolitans of this family in houses, barns and other buildings. In some parts of Germany is, for example, the field mouse, Apodemus agrarius, frequently.

Among the natural enemies are like the house mouse in the settlement area of ​​the human brown rats, cats and marten. In nature, you will be eaten by the red fox, by owls, snakes and birds of prey.

The long-tailed mice comprise about 750 species in 150 genera and are thus one of the richest families of mammals. Their original distribution area included Eurasia, Africa and Australia, by human influence, they are now spread around the world, on many islands where they were missing before.

System

The classification there are different views. In some classifications, all of the mice -like animals are combined into a family Muridae, but some groups are singled out as families of their own in recent classifications, these include the burrowers ( with voles, hamsters and Neuweltmäusen ), the Spalacidae and others.

The nomenclature used here largely follows Wilson & Reeder (2005) and shares the long-tailed mice in five subfamilies:

• Altweltmäuse ( Murinae, including the previously considered as independent lamellar tooth rats)
• Gerbils ( Gerbillinae )
• Deomyinae
• Mane rats ( Lophiomyinae )
• Furrows tooth - wood mice ( Leimacomyinae )