For a small animal, the response was huge. Media across the country reported a “sensational find,” with Bayerischer Rundfunk even reporting that the only “Bavarian” mammal had been rediscovered. So the echo that recently reverberated beyond Bavaria was huge – hugely appropriate. After all, the Bavarian short-eared mouse was considered lost in this country, despite its name. No one had seen it since its discovery near Garmisch-Partenkirchen in 1962. The only confirmed occurrence was limited to a forest meadow behind the border in Tyrol.
Now it’s back, the short-eared mouse, if you can say that, with a head and torso length of up to 106 millimeters and a distribution area reduced to Mittenwald. But at least there is an area. The Lake Constance kilch – a fish – can no longer be found in the waters around Lindau, but only in drawings. Extinct. The Regensburger Gelbling has disappeared from the Upper Palatinate; Apparently this butterfly still flutters sporadically in Eastern Europe. And you don’t have to start with bears. The last person who ventured permanently from Austria to Bavaria was called Bruno and was shot. Seen this way, the short-eared mouse’s border crossing has been going better so far.
The name has uniqueness Microtus bavaricus However, competition: Other animals and plants also have a Bavarian suffix, although there are no mammals among them. Bavarian spoonwort only grows in the foothills of the Alps (Cochlearia bavarica), which, according to the Federal Nature Conservation Union, arose “because Pyrenean and common spoonwort crossed.” A multi-cultural plant, so to speak. And the Bavarian spring snail crawls along the Isar and Lech (Bythinella bavarica). Theoretically it could be related to the Bavarian dwarf snail (Sadleriana bavarica) can be confused, which rarely happens in practice: the dwarf snail lives only by a stream in Munich. Where exactly is being kept secret for your protection. In view of this exclusivity, people are said to have tried to make the snail the symbol of Munich. So far unsuccessful.
The idea isn’t a bad one. Strictly speaking, the lions that pant from the Free State’s coat of arms have no place there either in nature or in name. On the contrary, the species would Panthera leo roaming through Bavaria, things would hardly be different for her than Bruno. If so, then at best the Berliners would have it on their coat of arms – as long as one generously ignores the fact that the lioness who made the capital unsafe last summer later turned out to be a wild pig. In any case, Berlin conditions are unthinkable in Bavaria. So away with the cat, up with real Bavarians: the short-eared mouse would be the better heraldic animal.