This genus of West Indian "shrews", endemic to the Greater Antilles (except Jamaica) and the Cayman Islands, is represented by as many as 12 nominal species.   These insectivores ranged in size from that of a chipmunk to a mouse and probably had long flexible snouts. Extinction dates are poorly constrained, but at least some species survived into the late Holocene  and probably overlapped with the arrival of rats around AD 1500.