How many baby Tate’s woolly mouse opossums are in a litter?
A Tate’s woolly mouse opossum (Micoureus paraguayanus) usually gives birth to around 5 babies.
Upon birth, they weight 2 grams (0 lbs) and measure 6 cm (0′ 3″). They are a member of the Didelphidae family (genus: Micoureus). An adult Tate’s woolly mouse opossum grows up to a size of 16.8 cm (0′ 7″).
To have a reference: Humans obviously usually have a litter size of one ;). Their babies are in the womb of their mother for 280 days (40 weeks) and reach an average size of 1.65m (5′ 5″). They weight in at 62 kg (137 lbs), which is obviously highly individual, and reach an average age of 75 years.
Tate’s woolly mouse opossum (Marmosa paraguayana) is an omnivorous, arboreal South American marsupial of the family Didelphidae, named after American zoologist George Henry Hamilton Tate. It is native to Atlantic coastal forests of Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina. The species lives in both primary and secondary forest, including forest fragments within grassland. Insects are a major component of its diet. It was formerly assigned to the genus Micoureus, which was made a subgenus of Marmosa in 2009. While its conservation status is “least concern”, its habitat is shrinking through urbanization and conversion to agriculture over much of its range.
Other animals of the family Didelphidae
Tate’s woolly mouse opossum is a member of the Didelphidae, as are these animals:
- Brazilian slender opossum weighting only 38 grams
- Bushy-tailed opossum weighting only 114 grams
- Panama slender opossum weighting only 29 grams
- Woolly mouse opossum with 6 babies per pregnancy
- Little woolly mouse opossum raching a size of 13.7 cm (0′ 6″)
- Emilia’s gracile opossum weighting only 7 grams
- Pinheiro’s slender opossum raching a size of 10.2 cm (0′ 5″)
- Brown-eared woolly opossum becoming 5 years old
- Gray four-eyed opossum with 4 babies per pregnancy
- Brazilian gracile opossum weighting only 29 grams
Animals that share a litter size with Tate’s woolly mouse opossum
Those animals also give birth to 5 babies at once:
- Marbled polecat
- Spectacled dormouse
- Alston’s cotton rat
- Grey red-backed vole
- Kultarr
- Eastern quoll
- Rufous mouse opossum
- Bobrinski’s jerboa
- Montane shrew
- Lorrain dormouse
Animals with the same weight as a Tate’s woolly mouse opossum
What other animals weight around 112 grams (0.25 lbs)?
- Harris’s antelope squirrel weighting 127 grams
- Ochre bush squirrel weighting 104 grams
- White-bellied mosaic-tailed rat weighting 104 grams
- Woolly giant rat weighting 116 grams
- Buller’s chipmunk weighting 100 grams
- Bare-backed rousette weighting 92 grams
- Fringe-tailed gerbil weighting 96 grams
- Angoni vlei rat weighting 100 grams
- Jaliscan cotton rat weighting 120 grams
- Yellow-nosed cotton rat weighting 122 grams
Animals with the same size as a Tate’s woolly mouse opossum
Also reaching around 16.8 cm (0′ 7″) in size do these animals:
- Red-bellied mosaic-tailed rat gets as big as 14.3 cm (0′ 6″)
- Gray tree rat gets as big as 19.2 cm (0′ 8″)
- Stein’s rat gets as big as 17.1 cm (0′ 7″)
- Lesser Angolan epauletted fruit bat gets as big as 16.2 cm (0′ 7″)
- Gambian sun squirrel gets as big as 19.6 cm (0′ 8″)
- Brown mouse lemur gets as big as 14.3 cm (0′ 6″)
- Australian swamp rat gets as big as 16 cm (0′ 7″)
- Ricefield rat gets as big as 19.3 cm (0′ 8″)
- Ihering’s Atlantic spiny rat gets as big as 19.7 cm (0′ 8″)
- Northern red-sided opossum gets as big as 13.5 cm (0′ 6″)