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Pikas

Submitted by kathy on March 30, 2010 - 7:44pm

  Has anyone here on Lasqueti ever seen a Pika? Perhaps in your garden or on walks or ? or what am I seeing here and there, 4 so far and i believe I'm not the only one who has seen this. One crossed the Schumack trail in front of my car today. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm. Not a rat, short,short tail that is not damaged, just the way it is. any suggestions ?  Thanks,   Mama Fish

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eating own faeces

Submitted by Jay on March 31, 2010 - 7:58am.

 Hello Fish,

The pika is a lagomorph.  Rabbits and hares are also lagomorphs.  They eat their own poo to release b vitamins that are not available to them on the first run.  Not all poos are created equal.  They only eat the gooey ones.  The rest are nice dry nuggets you can handle without disgust.  I highly recommend herbivore shyte over carnivore shyte any day in terms of texture and smell.  Pikas actually gather hay and stook it to dry in the sun before they bring it to back to their little mows and store it for winter food.  I have not seen any pikas.  Voles are very similar though not as cute.  They are large with a short tail, often mistaken for rats here on this island though they are very different. We have tons of voles.  They cross the road, it turns out, to get to the other side.

Jay Pika

Submitted by kathy on March 31, 2010 - 6:09pm.

 Thanks Jay, you rock !

Lagomorphs

Submitted by Peter Johnston on March 31, 2010 - 6:29pm.

Pikas and rabbits and hares might indeed eat some of their feces, or they might not. This doesn't seem to be among their defining characteristics.  They are distinguished from rodents

  • they have four incisors in the upper jaw (not two, as in the Rodentia);
  • they are almost wholly herbivorous (unlike rodents, many of which will eat both meat and vegetation; the few recorded exceptions within the Lagomorpha occur among members of both Lepus and Ochotona, and involve the occasional foraging for carrion as a supplementary winter food source);[4][5][6]
  • the male's scrotum is in front of the penis (unlike rodents', which is behind); and
  • the penis contains no bone (baculum), unlike in rodents.

See the whole entry at           http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagomorpha

Feces eaters (or at least lovers) would probably be called Copraphiles or something like that.     Peter

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