Elephant Shrews

Elephant shrews or jumping shrews are small insectivorous mammals [1] native to Africa [2], belonging to the Macroscelididae family, in the order Macroscelidea. Their traditional common English name comes from a fancied resemblance between their long noses and the trunk of an elephant and an assumed relationship with the true shrews (family Soricidae).  

They are widely distributed across the southern part of Africa, and although common nowhere, can be found in almost any type of habitat, from the Namib Desert [3] to boulder-strewn outcrops in South Africa to thick forest. 

Elephant Shrew Locomotion

Elephant shrews run by using a half-bound gait as seen n this slow motion video of a tethered Sengi on Watamu Beach, Kenya ca. 1971.