Jumping Mice
A bounding flash through dense streamside grass is the only glimpse most naturalists ever get of these beautiful mice.
About This Species
Two species of jumping mouse occur in Colorado; the western jumping mouse and the meadow jumping mouse. There are two subspecies of meadow jumping mice; the Preble's and the New Mexico. These are stunning, yellowish brown mice with pure white bellies and a prominent buff stripe on the side. The species are difficult to distinguish in the field except by geography. They are mostly nocturnal and hibernate in upland areas for eight months of the year, making them difficult to observe.
Protecting Preble's Meadow Jumping Mouse
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Physical Characteristics
The animals are about ten inches long, of which more than half is the thin, nearly naked tail. Weights are about an ounce.
Range
Western jumping mice occur in the mountains. Two subspecies of the meadow jumping mouse occur in separate areas of Colorado: Preble's meadow jumping mouse at the edge of the Great Plains, up against the Rockies, and the New Mexico meadow jumping mouse along the southwestern border of the state. Preble's jumping mice only exist in Colorado and Wyoming.
Habitat
Jumping mice live in vegetation near ponds and streams. Willow thickets or grassy aspen forests are prime habitat for the western jumping mouse. During summer months, the most important wetland types occupied by Preble’s meadow jumping mice include riparian areas and adjacent wet meadows. During the summer, they prefer dense shrub, grass and forb ground cover along creeks, rivers, and associated waterbodies. From early fall through the spring, they hibernate underground in burrows that are typically at the base of vegetation and have a northerly aspect. The habitat of the Preble's meadow jumping mouse has been greatly restricted by converting prairie potholes and other wetlands to irrigation reservoirs.
Diet
Their diet is mostly grass seeds, spiced with occasional insects. Jumping mice are the smallest of our true hibernators. In late summer they store fat for fuel before retiring for the long winter (September to May) to a burrow in a well-drained site above the spring flood-line and below the winter frost-line.
Reproduction
Jumping mice produce a single litter of four to eight young each summer; young of additional litters probably would not have time to fatten for hibernation. Gestation takes about 18 days, and the young are weaned at one month of age. For small mammals, jumping mice are long-lived, commonly living four years or more. (A vole twice the size of a jumping mouse would be in advanced old age at less than one year.) Perhaps their life span, like that of bats, is related to hibernation: they can live a long time because "they don't live very often."
Threats to Species
The Preble's meadow jumping mouse is listed as threatened by both the USFWS and CPW.