St Kilda house mouse facts for kids
Quick facts for kids St Kilda house mouse |
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| Conservation status | |
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Extinct (ca. 1930)
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Scientific classification  |
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| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Rodentia |
| Family: | Muridae |
| Genus: | Mus |
| Species: | |
| Subspecies: |
†M. m. muralis
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| Trinomial name | |
| Mus musculus muralis Barrett-Hamilton, 1899
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The St Kilda house mouse (Mus musculus muralis) was a special type of house mouse. It lived only on the remote islands of St Kilda in northwest Scotland. This unique mouse is now extinct.
Scientists first described the St Kilda house mouse in 1899. A natural historian named Gerald Edwin Hamilton Barrett-Hamilton studied it. He also described another mouse from the islands, the St Kilda field mouse.
How the St Kilda House Mouse Became Unique
It's not fully known when these mice first arrived on the St Kilda islands. They might have come with the Norsemen (Vikings) a long time ago. The Norse people visited and settled in Scotland.
Once on the islands, these mice lived in isolation. This means they were separated from other mice on the mainland. Over time, they changed and became different from their relatives. They grew larger than house mice found elsewhere. They also shared some features with a mouse subspecies from the Faroe Islands, called Mus musculus mykinessiensis.
Why the St Kilda House Mouse Disappeared
The St Kilda house mouse was very closely linked to human life. It lived mostly in and around the homes of the people on St Kilda.
In 1930, the last people living on St Kilda were moved away. They were evacuated from the islands. Because the St Kilda house mouse depended so much on human settlements, it quickly became extinct after the people left.
Today, you can still find some specimens of the St Kilda house mouse. These are preserved in museums. However, the St Kilda field mouse (Apodemus sylvaticus hirtensis), which is a type of wood mouse, still lives on the islands.
