How many baby Middle East blind mole-rats are in a litter?
A Middle East blind mole-rat (Nannospalax ehrenbergi) usually gives birth to around 3 babies.
Each of those little ones spend around 28 days as a fetus before they are released into the wild. Upon birth, they weight 5 grams (0.01 lbs) and measure 3.8 cm (0′ 2″). They are a member of the Muridae family (genus: Nannospalax). An adult Middle East blind mole-rat grows up to a size of 50 cm (1′ 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 Middle East blind mole-rat or Israel/Palestine mole-rat (Spalax ehrenbergi) (also known as Nannospalax ehrenbergi) is a species of rodent in the family Spalacidae.
Other animals of the family Muridae
Middle East blind mole-rat is a member of the Muridae, as are these animals:
- Moncton’s mosaic-tailed rat with 2 babies per pregnancy
- Cutch rat with 5 babies per pregnancy
- Southern vole weighting only 35 grams
- Oryzomys gorgasi weighting only 60 grams
- Mitchell’s hopping mouse with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Oecomys flavicans weighting only 73 grams
- Southern giant slender-tailed cloud rat with 1 babies per pregnancy
- Hispid hocicudo weighting only 36 grams
- Van Deusen’s rat with 2 babies per pregnancy
- Oecomys paricola weighting only 73 grams
Animals that share a litter size with Middle East blind mole-rat
Those animals also give birth to 3 babies at once:
- Juniper vole
- Bushy-tailed hairy-footed gerbil
- Peruvian tuco-tuco
- Coruro
- Gansu pika
- Emin’s gerbil
- Tibetan sand fox
- Namaqua rock rat
- Nephelomys albigularis
- Slender harvest mouse
Animals with the same weight as a Middle East blind mole-rat
What other animals weight around 180 grams (0.4 lbs)?
- Banks flying fox weighting 210 grams
- Arizona woodrat weighting 200 grams
- Spectral tarsier weighting 168 grams
- Felou gundi weighting 205 grams
- Perny’s long-nosed squirrel weighting 199 grams
- Knox Jones’s pocket gopher weighting 172 grams
- Nicobar treeshrew weighting 170 grams
- Allen’s cotton rat weighting 174 grams
- Tamaulipan woodrat weighting 198 grams
- New Britain naked-backed fruit bat weighting 179 grams