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Gray-tailed vole
The gray-tailed vole, ''Microtus canicaudus'', also known as the gray-tailed meadow vole or gray-tailed meadow mouse, is a rodent in the genus ''Microtus'' (small-eared "meadow voles") of the family Cricetidae. Voles are small mammals, and this species lies roughly in the middle of their size range. First collected in 1895, it is endemic to the Willamette Valley, Oregon, and Clark County, Washington, in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. Historically, they were found in the prairie areas of the Valley and, though many of these areas have been converted for agricultural purposes, these animals remain common. For reasons that remain unclear, vole population densities in any area may fluctuate widely from season to season and year to year. They are preyed upon by owls, hawks, and carnivorous mammals, and their parasites include fleas and ticks. These voles build underground burrows and complex tunnel networks, which they sometimes share with other burrowing animals. Relatively little is known about their behavior in the wild, because they are elusive and unlikely to enter traps.
==Taxonomy==
The scientific name of the gray-tailed vole is ''Microtus canicaudus''. The generic name ''Microtus'' derives from the Ancient Greek words (small) and (ear). The species name ''canicaudus'' derives from the Latin ' (gray) and ' (tail). The gray-tailed vole was first described in 1897 by Gerrit S. Miller in the ''Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington''. The type specimen was collected in McCoy, Oregon, on December 1, 1895, by B.J. Bretherton. Miller's initial examination included the type specimen and eleven others. Two from his collection had been obtained in Beaverton. The remaining specimens, collected in McCoy, were part of the US National Museum Biological Survey under C. Hart Merriam.
The gray-tailed vole is monotypic, but there are some differences between specimens obtained on either side of the Columbia River. It appears to be a sibling species of the montane vole (''Microtus montanus'') or of Townsend's vole (''M. townsendii''). It was classified as a geographic race or subspecies of the montane vole by Hall and Kelson in 1951, but laboratory analyses, including electrophoresis and karyotype evaluations, subsequently confirmed that they are two separate species. The karyotypes of the montane vole and the gray-tailed vole are dissimilar in terms of homology in 6 of 22 autosomal arms. The quantity and distribution of heterochromatin among both X chromosomes and autosomes is different as well. The two species are allopatric, but not contiguously so.
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