I got one concern. Why would parashrews (those shrew descendants with hair on tails for parachuting) die if they land in water? That makes no sense. They won't get killed instantly by landing in a lake.
My guess is that they're drowning? The ones that land in the lake seem to be struggling a bit before they die, and even if the lake's not that deep, it probably doesn't take a lot of water to drown such a small animal. The one parashrew that hit land didn't have anything bad happen to it. Also I think the book says that they only use their parachutes once, when leaving the nest to live on their own, and then they fall off. So maybe the hairs fell off once they landed and now they have nothing to keep afloat.
I got one concern. Why would parashrews (those shrew descendants with hair on tails for parachuting) die if they land in water? That makes no sense. They won't get killed instantly by landing in a lake.
My guess is that they're drowning? The ones that land in the lake seem to be struggling a bit before they die, and even if the lake's not that deep, it probably doesn't take a lot of water to drown such a small animal. The one parashrew that hit land didn't have anything bad happen to it.
Also I think the book says that they only use their parachutes once, when leaving the nest to live on their own, and then they fall off. So maybe the hairs fell off once they landed and now they have nothing to keep afloat.
It's cause the parachute tails prevent them from swimming, so they drown