How many baby Namaqua rock rats are in a litter?
A Namaqua rock rat (Micaelamys namaquensis) usually gives birth to around 3 babies.With 2 litters per year, that sums up to a yearly offspring of 6 babies.
Each of those little ones spend around 21 days as a fetus before they are released into the wild. Upon birth, they weight 2 grams (0 lbs) and measure 6 cm (0′ 3″). They are a member of the Muridae family (genus: Micaelamys). An adult Namaqua rock rat grows up to a size of 10.8 cm (0′ 5″).
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 Namaqua rock rat (Aethomys namaquensis) is a species of rodent in the family Muridae. It is sometimes included in the genus Micaelamys.It is found in Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Eswatini, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.Its natural habitats are temperate forest, dry savanna, temperate shrubland, subtropical or tropical dry shrubland, temperate grassland, rocky areas, hot desert, temperate desert, rocky shores, arable land, rural gardens, and urban areas.Parasites include the chigger species: Afropolonia tgifi, Gahrliepia nana, Acomatacarus thallomyia, Hyracarus lawrencei, Herpetacarus aethomys, Herpetacarus longispinus, and Zumptrombicula misonnei.
Other animals of the family Muridae
Namaqua rock rat is a member of the Muridae, as are these animals:
- Gray-bellied pencil-tailed tree mouse weighting only 28 grams
- Mountain spiny rat weighting only 159 grams
- Oecomys cleberi weighting only 73 grams
- Eligmodontia typus with 6 babies per pregnancy
- Dusky mosaic-tailed rat raching a size of 15.2 cm (0′ 6″)
- Intelligent grass mouse weighting only 28 grams
- Cameroon soft-furred mouse with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Masked white-tailed rat with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Eastern shrew mouse weighting only 16 grams
- African grass rat with 4 babies per pregnancy
Animals that share a litter size with Namaqua rock rat
Those animals also give birth to 3 babies at once:
- Holochilus brasiliensis
- Dwarf fat-tailed jerboa
- Japanese mole
- Black-tailed dasyure
- North American beaver
- Bahamian raccoon
- Dolorous grass mouse
- Cape golden mole
- Large mole
- American hog-nosed skunk
Animals with the same weight as a Namaqua rock rat
What other animals weight around 57 grams (0.13 lbs)?
- Aquatic rat weighting 66 grams
- Emilia’s short-tailed opossum weighting 52 grams
- Hildegarde’s broad-headed mouse weighting 55 grams
- Whitehead’s spiny rat weighting 57 grams
- Gray mouse lemur weighting 68 grams
- Social vole weighting 48 grams
- Panamint chipmunk weighting 51 grams
- Indonesian short-nosed fruit bat weighting 59 grams
- Cape elephant shrew weighting 49 grams
- Andean rat weighting 53 grams