How many baby Himalayan shrews are in a litter?
A Himalayan shrew (Soriculus nigrescens) usually gives birth to around 4 babies.
Upon birth, they weight 5 grams (0.01 lbs) and measure 1.6 cm (0′ 1″). They are a member of the Soricidae family (genus: Soriculus). An adult Himalayan shrew grows up to a size of 9.8 cm (0′ 4″).
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 Himalayan shrew (Soriculus nigrescens) is found in Bhutan, China, India, Myanmar, and Nepal, is currently the only species in the genus Soriculus within the tribe Nectogalini, although the species Chodsigoa and Episoriculus, which occur in southeastern Asia, as well as those of the fossil European genus Asoriculus, were formerly included there.
Other animals of the family Soricidae
Himalayan shrew is a member of the Soricidae, as are these animals:
- Long-clawed shrew with 5 babies per pregnancy
- Piebald shrew with 5 babies per pregnancy
- Asiatic short-tailed shrew weighting only 12 grams
- East African highland shrew with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Slender shrew with 5 babies per pregnancy
- Greater stripe-backed shrew with 4 babies per pregnancy
- Volcano shrew weighting only 3 grams
- Grasse’s shrew raching a size of 6.3 cm (0′ 3″)
- Vagrant shrew with 5 babies per pregnancy
- Andean small-eared shrew weighting only 11 grams
Animals that share a litter size with Himalayan shrew
Those animals also give birth to 4 babies at once:
- Townsend’s chipmunk
- Lesser short-tailed gerbil
- Common vole
- Side-striped jackal
- Darwin’s leaf-eared mouse
- Shrew gymnure
- Gray four-eyed opossum
- Gray-collared chipmunk
- Pousargues’s mongoose
- Golden jackal
Animals with the same weight as a Himalayan shrew
What other animals weight around 14 grams (0.03 lbs)?
- Central pebble-mound mouse weighting 12 grams
- Niobe’s shrew weighting 16 grams
- Bates’s shrew weighting 16 grams
- Buffy flower bat weighting 16 grams
- Luzon fruit bat weighting 16 grams
- Ryukyu mouse weighting 14 grams
- Dwarf bonneted bat weighting 12 grams
- Trident bat weighting 12 grams
- Ooldea dunnart weighting 12 grams
- Isabelle’s ghost bat weighting 12 grams
Animals with the same size as a Himalayan shrew
Also reaching around 9.8 cm (0′ 4″) in size do these animals:
- Sandstone false antechinus gets as big as 9.6 cm (0′ 4″)
- Yellow-sided opossum gets as big as 9.9 cm (0′ 4″)
- Olive grass mouse gets as big as 9.6 cm (0′ 4″)
- Big-eared woolly bat gets as big as 10.3 cm (0′ 5″)
- Bushy-tailed hairy-footed gerbil gets as big as 9.8 cm (0′ 4″)
- Yucatan deer mouse gets as big as 10 cm (0′ 4″)
- São Paulo grass mouse gets as big as 8.8 cm (0′ 4″)
- Four-striped grass mouse gets as big as 10.8 cm (0′ 5″)
- False water rat gets as big as 11.3 cm (0′ 5″)
- Umboi tube-nosed fruit bat gets as big as 9.3 cm (0′ 4″)