English

Woodland jumping mouse (Napaeozapus insignis)

Wikispecies

Noun

jumping mouse ‎(plural jumping mice)

1. Any species of the taxonomic subfamily Zapodinae of rodents, variously endemic to North America or China.
   • 1953, Lowell Sumner, Joseph Scattergood Dixon, Birds and Mammals of the Sierra Nevada, page 423,

     The jumping mouse is little larger than a house mouse and has a very long, scaly, untufted tail, one-third longer than the head and body. […] In fact, various observers have found that jumping mice with injured or amputated tails tumble over and are as helpless as a ship without a rudder.

   • 1954, Lloyd Glenn Ingles, Mammals of California and Its Coastal Waters, page 256,

     In some respects a jumping mouse resembles kangaroo rats and kangaroo mice in habits and appearance. A jumping mouse may readily be distinguished from these animals, however, by its lack of fur-lined cheek pouches and by its preference for, or nearness to, moist habitats instead of arid places.

   • 1999, Marcia Bonta, Appalachian Summer, page 138,

     That was when we realized that we have two species of jumping mice on the mountain.

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