How many baby Field voles are in a litter?
A Field vole (Microtus agrestis) usually gives birth to around 4 babies.With 3 litters per year, that sums up to a yearly offspring of 12 babies.
Each of those little ones spend around 20 days as a fetus before they are released into the wild. Upon birth, they weight 2 grams (0 lbs) and measure 1.8 cm (0′ 1″). They are a member of the Muridae family (genus: Microtus). An adult Field vole grows up to a size of 16 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.
The field vole or short-tailed vole (Microtus agrestis) is a grey-brown vole, around four inches (ten centimetres) in length, with a short tail. It is one of the most common mammals in Europe, with a range extending from the Atlantic coast to Lake Baikal. These voles are found in moist grassy habitats, such as woodland, marsh or on river banks. Although they make shallow burrows, they usually build nests above ground. They are an important food source for owls and some other predators and their population size tends to peak and trough cyclically. Field voles breed prolifically, mainly in summer, but often all year round, even under snow. Females produce up to seven litters a year, each averaging from four to six young which are weaned after about fourteen days. The field vole is both widespread and common and is listed as being of “Least Concern” by the IUCN.
Other animals of the family Muridae
Field vole is a member of the Muridae, as are these animals:
- Lesser hamster-rat with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Venezuelan climbing mouse weighting only 89 grams
- Djoongari with 2 babies per pregnancy
- Big-eared climbing rat with 2 babies per pregnancy
- Black-tailed mosaic-tailed rat with 2 babies per pregnancy
- Lindbergh’s grass mouse weighting only 26 grams
- Luzon striped rat weighting only 152 grams
- Yellow steppe lemming with 7 babies per pregnancy
- Neacomys guianae weighting only 15 grams
- Blanford’s rat with 2 babies per pregnancy
Animals that share a litter size with Field vole
Those animals also give birth to 4 babies at once:
- Culpeo
- Southern big-eared mouse
- Smoke-bellied rat
- Parantechinus bilarni
- Andean vesper mouse
- Lesser short-tailed gerbil
- Zagros Mountains mouse-like hamster
- Side-striped jackal
- Darwin’s leaf-eared mouse
- Groundhog
Animals that get as old as a Field vole
Other animals that usually reach the age of 3.25 years:
- Bush rat with 3.42 years
- Gray tree rat with 3.75 years
- Eurasian water shrew with 3 years
- Dibbler with 3 years
- Southern brown bandicoot with 3.75 years
- Molina’s hog-nosed skunk with 3.33 years
- Lowland streaked tenrec with 2.67 years
- Long-tailed pygmy possum with 3.17 years
- Southwestern myotis with 3.17 years
- Monito del monte with 3.17 years
Animals with the same weight as a Field vole
What other animals weight around 35 grams (0.08 lbs)?
- Least chipmunk weighting 42 grams
- White-bellied slender opossum weighting 34 grams
- Mesquite mouse weighting 40 grams
- Hairy-tailed bolo mouse weighting 39 grams
- Wagner’s bonneted bat weighting 36 grams
- Sandhill dunnart weighting 33 grams
- White-striped free-tailed bat weighting 36 grams
- Mindanao lowland forest mouse weighting 31 grams
- Large myotis weighting 42 grams
- White-ankled mouse weighting 38 grams