[5] The species is found in central and southern Chile, and in Argentina as far southward as the Rio Negro and Chubut provinces of Patagonia.

It is an efficient excavator and digs burrows, but it is also a good tree climber.

In Argentina it feeds on berries, seeds, insects, slugs, worms, fungi and fern spores.

It is also an important reservoir species for the Andes virus, which is a major causative agent of the disease Hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome.

[5] A. longipilis has a wide range and is presumed to have a large total population.