Mice are killed by the least weasel biting into the back of the head
and neck according to Allen (1940:460) who reported upon the growth of
five young, from Michigan, that he had in captivity. He further states
that a weasel was able to kill a mouse in 30 seconds. One large
_Microtus_ introduced into the cage slept with a weasel for several
days and ate parts of the mice that the weasel killed but then the
weasel killed this mouse! Llewellyn (1942:440-441), in writing of a
captive from Virginia, says: "When a live mouse was placed in the cage,
the weasel sprang upon it almost instantly. Grasping the mouse by the
back of the head, the weasel bit its victim through the skull several
times in rapid succession and held on with its sharp teeth. The sound
of the teeth piercing the bone was distinctly audible at a distance of
several feet. During this interval the weasel hugged the mouse closely
with its fore legs and pressed it firmly to its belly through a kicking
motion of the hind legs. The hold on the back of the head was not
relinquished until the mouse was dead. The killing took only a few
seconds. Upon releasing the mouse the weasel usually came to the front
of the cage and inspected the observer for an interval of several
seconds after which it returned to its prey and began its meal at once.
Sometimes the blood would be licked from the wound in the back of the
head or perhaps an ear would be chewed a bit and the blood licked off,
but never did the weasel 'cut the throat' of its prey and 'suck the
blood.'
"The weasel ate the head and brain first, beginning at the back of the
head and working forward. Just before reaching the nose the process was
reversed and eating then proceeded from the base of the skull toward
the tail of the mouse. The tip of the nose, maxilla with teeth, and the
tail seemed to be the parts least preferred; they were not eaten when
an abundance of food was present. At no time did the weasel place its
front feet on the mouse in an attempt to hold it. A second or third
mouse was killed immediately upon being placed in the cage even though
the first one had not been consumed. The weasel, however, usually
returned to the partially eaten mouse and finished it before starting
on a new one. Upon completing a meal, especially if the meal had been
particularly bloody, the weasel rubbed its chin on the bottom of the
cage, scooting along and appearing more snakelike than normal. Whenever
I attempted to remove a mouse, or partially eaten one, from the cage,
the weasel hung to the mouse tenaciously, and often allowed itself to
be lifted up in this manner.
"In the six days that the weasel was kept in captivity it was fed 10
house mice having a total weight of 118 grams. As no food was given on
one day, the amount of food eaten is probably slightly below the actual
capacity of the animal. Since the weasel weighed only about 32 grams,
the average amount of food eaten a day was slightly in excess of
one-half the weight of the animal."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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