Endangered Strangers: The Long-eared Jerboa

WHY HELLO...

I AM THE LONG-EARED JERBOA.

HOW DO YOU DO?

Me? Not so great, hoomanz be disturbin my habitatz : grazin' their livestockz, riding their motorbikez. Not cool hoomanz.

The Long-eared Jerboa resides in Northwest China and Southern Mongolia. There are around 25 species of jerboas on our planet. The Long-eared Jerboa's body is around 7-10 centimeters long and their tail can be up to 18 centimeters long!

This Jerboa has some pretty cool adaptations. Tufts of stiff hairs onthe soles of his feet enable the Jerboa to walk on loose sand. His back legs are much longer than his front legs and enable him to hop about like a kangaroo. Not tomention: his ears are 1/3 larger than his head! Even with these big ears the Long-eared Jerboa can run faster than other jerboas. They just press their big ears flat on their back while running to become more aerodynamic.

Astonishingly, the ancient battles of the mongol empire could be having a negative effect on the Long-eared Jerboas of today. According to EDGE fellow Uuganbadrakh "The Mongolian Gobi desert contains many ancient objects, such as rust of arrow, bone of dinosaurs, jewels and so on." Sounds magical; a treasure hunters dream. Except that treasure hunters in the Gobi could be damaging the jerboa's habitat. People digging for rusty arrow heads in the Gobi to sell to China are leaving multitudes of holes in the ground. Uuganbadrakh speculates that these holes are damaging or disturbing the Jerboa's habitat.

I can has cheezburger? Nope, you can have insects, and possibly seeds and succulent plants.

And you, dear reader, can have the first known footage of the Long-eared Jerboa in the wild courtesy of EDGE:



We will be featuring a new Endangered Stranger every Wednesday so be sure to check back next week!