The small nocturnal rodent famous for hibernating and appearing in Alice in Wonderland is the dormouse.
Dormice belong to the rodent family Gliridae and are native to parts of Europe, Asia and Africa. They are generally nocturnal, using the darkness to forage for fruit, seeds, nuts, insects and other foods. In temperate regions, many species spend the colder months in hibernation, often underground or beneath leaf litter.
Their name is linked to their long dormant period: some dormice hibernate for six months or longer. Before winter, they build fat reserves, allowing them to survive while their body temperature, heart rate and metabolism fall dramatically. They may briefly wake during mild weather, sometimes eating food stored nearby.
The dormouse in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is one of the Mad Hatter’s tea-party guests. That literary character helped make the animal famous, although the story’s sleepy, sluggish portrayal is not a complete description of real dormice. A dormouse is also not simply a “sleeping mouse”: it belongs to a separate rodent family and has distinctive adaptations for seasonal dormancy.