Scientists discovered that the world’s highest dwelling mammal is a yellow-rumped leaf-eared mouse. The mouse lives on Llullaillaco, the world’s highest historically active volcano, straddling Argentina and Chile. It survives at an elevation above 20,000 feet, where no plants grow. What does it eat? It’s a surprise that a mouse can live in such a hostile environment, as National Geographic detailed:
“It’s hard to overstate how hostile an environment it is,” says Jay Storz, a biologist at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, and a National Geographic Explorer.
Intrigued by the discovery, Storz organized an expedition to the volcano in February specifically to search for rodents. And rodents he found. In fact, he encountered another yellow-rumped mouse even higher than previously sighted, atop the very summit of Llullaillaco, at 22,110 feet—breaking the record announced just last year.
The yellow-rumped leaf-eared mouse (Phyllotis xanthopygus), is a known species that lives in the foothills and mountains of the Andes, and also can be found as low as sea level. (Related: Meet the animals that thrive in extreme mountain conditions.)
That means the mouse has an unprecedented elevation range of more than 22,000 feet. “That wide of a range is extraordinary,” says Scott Steppan, a mouse expert and biology professor at Florida State University. “No other species does that.”
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Paywall at the link. What DOES it eat?
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ummm. we do
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