European mink - WikiHQ

The European mink (Mustela lutreola), also known as the Russian mink and Eurasian mink, is a semiaquatic species of mustelid native to Europe.

It is similar in colour to the American mink, but is slightly smaller and has a less specialized skull. Despite having a similar name, build and behaviour, the European mink is not closely related to the American mink, being much closer to the European polecat and Siberian weasel (kolonok). The European mink occurs primarily by forest streams unlikely to freeze in winter.

Evolution and taxonomy

Fossil finds of the European mink are very rare, thus indicating the species is either a relative newcomer to Europe, probably having originated in North America, or a recent speciation caused by hybridization. It likely first arose in the Middle Pleistocene, with several fossils in Europe dated to the Late Pleistocene being found in caves and some suggesting early exploitation by humans. Genetic analyses indicate, rather than being closely related to the American mink, the European mink's closest relative is the European polecat (perhaps due to past hybridization) and the Siberian weasel, seven subspecies are recognised.

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!Subspecies

!Trinomial authority

!Description

!Range

!Synonyms

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|Northern mink M. l. lutreola

(Nominate subspecies)

|Linnaeus, 1758

|The pelt is dark brownish-chestnut or dark brown with a diffuse broad belt on the back. The tail tip is black and the underfur is dark bluish-grey. The overall pelage is long, compact and silky. Adult males measure in body length and have a tail length of (38% of its body length).

|Northern European Russia and Finland

|alba (de Sélys Longchamps, 1839)

alpinus (Ogérien, 1863)

europeae (Homeyer, 1879)

fulva (Kerr, 1792)

minor (Erxleben, 1777)

wyborgensis (Barrett-Hamilton, 1904)

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|French mink M. l. biedermanni

|Matschie, 1912

|France

|armorica (Matschie, 1912)

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|M. l. binominata

|Ellerman and Morrison-Scott, 1951

|caucasica (Novikov, 1939)

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|Middle European mink M. l. cylipena

|Matschie, 1912

|A very large subspecies, it is only slightly smaller than M. l. turovi. The fur is quite dark and corresponds to the colour of M. l. novikovi. Adult males measure in length, while females measure . Tail length in males is , while in females it is .

|The Kaliningrad Oblast, Lithuania, western Latvia, middle Europe (except the extreme west (France), Hungary, Romania, the former Yugoslavia and Poland)

|albica (Matschie, 1912)

budina (Matschie, 1912)

glogeri (Matschie, 1912)

varina (Matschie, 1912)

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|Middle Russian mink M. l. novikovi

|Ellerman and Morrison-Scott, 1951

|A moderately-sized subspecies, it is slightly larger than M. l. lutreola. It is lighter-coloured than M. l. lutreola, being dark tawny or dark brown with a film of light reddish highlights. The dark belt on the back is weakly defined or absent. The pelage is overall shorter, less dense and less silky than M. l. lutreola. Adult males measure in body length.

|The middle zone of the European part of the former Soviet Union (Estonia, eastern Latvia, Belarus, eastern Ukraine, and the lower Don and lower Volga regions)

|borealis (Novikov, 1939)

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|Carpathian mink Mustela l. transsylvanica

150 px

|Éhik, 1932

|Smaller than M. l. turovi, with dark tawny fur

|Moldavia, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria and the former Yugoslavia

|ehiki (Kretzoi, 1942)

hungarica (Éhik, 1932)

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|Caucasian mink M. l. turovi

|Kuznetsov in Novikov, 1939

|A large-sized subspecies, it has quite long, but sparse and coarse pelage and less compact underfur. The fur is light tawny or light brown with clear rusty highlights. The underfur is light bluish-grey. White chest markings are much more frequent in this subspecies than in others. The ends of the limbs are often white. Adult males usually measure more than long. The European mink's skull is less elongated than the kolonok's, with more widely spaced zygomatic arches and has a less massive facial region. In general characteristics, the skull is intermediate in shape between that of the Siberian weasel and the European polecat. Overall, the skull is less specialized for carnivory than that of polecats and the American mink. Males measure in body length, while females measure . Tail length is in males and . Overall weight is . When swimming, it paddles with both its front and back limbs simultaneously.

In dark coloured individuals, the fur is dark brown or almost blackish-brown, while light individuals are reddish brown. Fur colour is evenly distributed over the whole body, though in a few cases, the belly is a bit lighter than the upper parts. In particularly dark individuals, a dark, broad dorsal belt is present. The limbs and tail are slightly darker than the trunk. The face has no colour pattern, though its upper and lower lips and chin are pure white. White markings may also occur on the lower surface of the neck and chest. Occasionally, colour mutations such as albinos and white spots throughout the pelage occur. The summer fur is somewhat lighter, and dirty in tone, with more reddish highlights. The European mink's skull is much less specialised than the American species' in the direction of carnivory, bearing more infantile features, such as a weaker dentition and less strongly developed projections. The European mink is reportedly less efficient than the American species underwater.

Behaviour

Territorial and denning behaviours

thumb|European mink by a pond

The European mink does not form large territories, possibly due to the abundance of food on the banks of small water bodies. The size of each territory varies according to the availability of food; in areas with water meadows with little food, the home range is , though it is more usual for territories to be . Summer territories are smaller than winter territories. Along shorelines, the length of a home range varies from , with a width of .

The European mink has both a permanent burrow and temporary shelters. The former is used all year except during floods, and is located no more than from the water's edge. The construction of the burrow is not complex, often consisting of one or two passages in diameter and in length, leading to a nest chamber measuring . Nesting chambers are lined with straw, moss, mouse wool and bird feathers.

Diet

The European mink has a diverse diet consisting largely of aquatic and riparian fauna. Differences between its diet and that of the American mink are small. Voles are the most important food source, closely followed by crustaceans, frogs and water insects. Fish are an important food source in floodlands, with cases being known of European minks catching fish weighing . The European mink's daily food requirement is . In times of food abundance, it caches its food.

Range and status

The European mink is mostly restricted to Europe. Its range was widespread in the 19th century, with a distribution extending from northern Spain in the west to the river Ob (just east of the Urals) in the east, and from the Archangelsk region in the north to the northern Caucasus in the south. Over the last 150 years, though, it has severely declined by more than 90% and been extirpated or greatly reduced over most of its former range. The current range includes an isolated population in northern Spain and western France, which is widely disjunct from the main range in Eastern Europe (Latvia, Estonia, Belarus, Ukraine, central regions of European Russia, the Danube Delta in Romania and northwestern Bulgaria). It occurs from sea level to . and a project to re-establish them on the nearby island of Saaremaa is underway, with the first minks arriving in 2022.

Decline

thumb|Illustration from [[Brehms Tierleben]]

The earliest actual records of decreases in European mink numbers occurred in Germany, having already become extinct in several areas by the middle of the 18th century. A similar pattern occurred in Switzerland, with no records of minks being published in the 20th century. Records of minks in Austria stopped by the late 18th century. By the 1930s–1950s, the European mink became extinct in Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and possibly Bulgaria. In Finland, the main decline occurred in the 1920s-1950s and the species was thought to be extinct in the 1970s, though a few specimens were reported in the 1990s. In Latvia, the European mink was thought to be extinct for years, until a specimen was captured in 1992. In Lithuania, the last specimens were caught in 1978–79. The decline of the European mink in Estonia and Belarus was rapid during the 1980s, with only a few small, fragmented populations in the northeastern regions of both countries being reported in the 1990s. The decline of European mink numbers in Ukraine began in the late 1950s, with now only a few small and isolated populations being reported in the upper courses of the Ukrainian Carpathian rivers. Their numbers in Moldova began to drop very quickly in the 1930s, with the last known population having been confined to the lower course of the River Prut on the Romanian border by the late 1980s. In Romania, the European mink was very common and widely distributed, with 8000–10,000 being captured in 1960. Currently, Romanian mink populations are confined to the Danube Delta. In European Russia, the European mink was common and widespread in the early 20th century, but began to decline during the 1950s–1970s. The core of their range was in the Tver Region, though they began to decline there by the 1990s, which was worsened by a colonisation of the area by the American mink. Between 1981 and 1989, 388 European minks were introduced to two of the Kurile Islands, though by the 1990s, the population there was found to be lower than that originally released. In France and Spain, an isolated range occurs, extending from Brittany to northern Spain. Data from the 1990s indicate the European mink has disappeared from the northern half of this previous range. Such hybridisation is very rare in the wild, and typically only occurs where European minks are declining. A polecat-mink hybrid has a poorly defined facial mask, yellow fur on the ears, grey-yellow underfur and long, dark brown guard hairs. Fairly large, the males attain the peak sizes known for European polecats (weighing and measuring in length), and females are much larger than female European minks (weighing and measuring in length). The majority of polecat-mink hybrids have skulls bearing greater similarities to those of polecats than to minks.