Some nice photos of a species I know nothing about
http://focusingonwildlife.com/news/japanese-weasel-in-motion/
Jon
Japanese Weasel
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For what it is worth, Japanese Weasel is suppose to be easy on Miyake-jima Island, where they are introduced. I didn’t get to make it to this island on my Japan visit, but a friend in the same fellowship program as me did and saw them there.
Nice photos! I think this might be another species. Just found out that Siberian Weasel is introduced to South Japan and is doing well (Kyushu,
Shikoku, and western Honshu, see: http://www1.unifi.it/caryologia/past_volumes/53_3_4/13.pdf). This sighting is in southern Kyushu, where both species occur. BTW until 2000 Japanese Weasel was considered a subspecies of Siberian Weasel.
I cannot find information on separating both species in the field but looking at the facial masks in HBMW:Carnivores (Plate 36, p.648) this one looks more like a Siberian Weasel. So, ór both weasels are very difficult to tell apart in the field ór Japanese weasel photos on google are misidentified.
I hope someone else can make a definitive judgement on this issue?
Looks like Siberian to me… the Japanese I’ve seen were much less orange.
Just came back from Hokkaido – Yoroushi Onsen to be exact. We came across 7-8 Japanese Weasels frequenting the bird feeders over the two days there. Very cool. I will have our trip report up in a week or two…Evidently they are common in the region…