How many baby Golden hamsters are in a litter?
A Golden hamster (Mesocricetus auratus) usually gives birth to around 8 babies.With 4 litters per year, that sums up to a yearly offspring of 32 babies.
Each of those little ones spend around 15 days as a fetus before they are released into the wild. Upon birth, they weight 2 grams (0 lbs) and measure 1.5 cm (0′ 1″). They are a member of the Muridae family (genus: Mesocricetus). An adult Golden hamster grows up to a size of 18 cm (0′ 8″).
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 golden or Syrian hamster (Mesocricetus auratus) is a rodent belonging to the hamster subfamily, Cricetinae. Their natural geographical range is limited to arid areas of northern Syria and southern Turkey. Their numbers have been declining in the wild due to a loss of habitat from agriculture and deliberate elimination by humans. Thus, wild golden hamsters are now considered vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.However, captive breeding programs are well-established, and captive-bred golden hamsters are often kept as small house pets. Syrian hamsters are larger than many of the dwarf hamsters kept as pocket pets (up to 5x larger), and weigh about the same as a sugar glider, though the wild European hamster exceeds Syrian hamsters in size. They are also used as scientific research animals throughout the world.
Other animals of the family Muridae
Golden hamster is a member of the Muridae, as are these animals:
- Friendly leaf-eared mouse weighting only 20 grams
- Kemp’s spiny mouse weighting only 22 grams
- Rothschild’s woolly rat with 1 babies per pregnancy
- Southern multimammate mouse with 7 babies per pregnancy
- Fat-tailed gerbil with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Yellow-bellied climbing mouse weighting only 59 grams
- Zagros Mountains mouse-like hamster with 4 babies per pregnancy
- Arctic lemming with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Luzon short-nosed rat raching a size of 15.2 cm (0′ 6″)
- Long-haired rat weighting only 221 grams
Animals that share a litter size with Golden hamster
Those animals also give birth to 8 babies at once:
- Virginia opossum
- African wild dog
- Campbell’s dwarf hamster
- Slender-tailed dunnart
- Brown rat
- Narrow-headed vole
- Tundra shrew
- Yellow-footed antechinus
- Eurasian least shrew
- White-tailed antelope squirrel
Animals that get as old as a Golden hamster
Other animals that usually reach the age of 10 years:
- Rufous rat-kangaroo with 8 years
- Greater bamboo lemur with 12 years
- Bush dog with 10.33 years
- Yellow-footed rock-wallaby with 12 years
- Eastern spotted skunk with 10 years
- Greater hedgehog tenrec with 10.5 years
- Crowned lemur with 9.17 years
- Southern tamandua with 9 years
- Black-tailed prairie dog with 8.5 years
- San Diego pocket mouse with 8.25 years
Animals with the same weight as a Golden hamster
What other animals weight around 98 grams (0.22 lbs)?
- Fringe-tailed gerbil weighting 95 grams
- Dian’s tarsier weighting 110 grams
- Peterson’s chinchilla mouse weighting 83 grams
- Golden Oldfield mouse weighting 88 grams
- Ghana rufous-nosed rat weighting 85 grams
- Owl’s spiny rat weighting 114 grams
- Plain brush-tailed rat weighting 105 grams
- Narrow-faced kangaroo rat weighting 81 grams
- Highveld gerbil weighting 89 grams
- Biak glider weighting 90 grams
Animals with the same size as a Golden hamster
Also reaching around 18 cm (0′ 8″) in size do these animals:
- Red-cheeked flying squirrel gets as big as 18.1 cm (0′ 8″)
- Hispid cotton rat gets as big as 16.7 cm (0′ 7″)
- White-bellied woolly mouse opossum gets as big as 16.1 cm (0′ 7″)
- Brandt’s hedgehog gets as big as 20.7 cm (0′ 9″)
- Isarog shrew-rat gets as big as 18.7 cm (0′ 8″)
- Grey-bellied squirrel gets as big as 21.1 cm (0′ 9″)
- Smith’s bush squirrel gets as big as 17.2 cm (0′ 7″)
- Four-toed hedgehog gets as big as 15.9 cm (0′ 7″)
- Lesser flying fox gets as big as 19 cm (0′ 8″)
- Stein’s rat gets as big as 17.1 cm (0′ 7″)