How many baby Pygmy gerbils are in a litter?
A Pygmy gerbil (Gerbillus henleyi) usually gives birth to around 4 babies.
Upon birth, they weight 1 grams (0 lbs) and measure 3.4 cm (0′ 2″). They are a member of the Muridae family (genus: Gerbillus). An adult Pygmy gerbil grows up to a size of 8.3 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 pygmy gerbil (Gerbillus henleyi) is distributed mainly in Algeria to Israel and the Arabian Peninsula. It is also known as Henley’s gerbil or pygmy dipodil. Gerbillus henleyi is a long-tailed small gerbil with a back coat that is dark grey-brown which has specific white spots, and the species has small upper molars. Gerbillus henleyi, like other species of the Genus Gerbillus, forage nocturnally and have mainly a plant based diet, and also depend on those dietary items for energy and water.
Other animals of the family Muridae
Pygmy gerbil is a member of the Muridae, as are these animals:
- Puno grass mouse weighting only 30 grams
- White-footed vole with 2 babies per pregnancy
- Gray spiny mouse raching a size of 8.5 cm (0′ 4″)
- Lesser Wilfred’s mouse weighting only 22 grams
- Nephelomys keaysi weighting only 58 grams
- Tanala tufted-tailed rat weighting only 90 grams
- Tamaulipan woodrat weighting only 198 grams
- Deroo’s mouse with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Mesquite mouse with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Oecomys concolor with 1 babies per pregnancy
Animals that share a litter size with Pygmy gerbil
Those animals also give birth to 4 babies at once:
- Lesser Egyptian gerbil
- Hairy-tailed bolo mouse
- Llanos long-nosed armadillo
- Gunnison’s prairie dog
- Northern pika
- Alpine marmot
- Mountain cottontail
- Tropical pocket gopher
- Typical striped grass mouse
- Geata mouse shrew
Animals with the same weight as a Pygmy gerbil
What other animals weight around 8 grams (0.02 lbs)?
- Lesser long-tongued bat weighting 8 grams
- Fringed myotis weighting 8 grams
- Greater white-toothed shrew weighting 9 grams
- Egyptian slit-faced bat weighting 9 grams
- Coelops frithi weighting 7 grams
- Lesser brown horseshoe bat weighting 7 grams
- Apennine shrew weighting 8 grams
- Chestnut sac-winged bat weighting 9 grams
- Toad mouse weighting 8 grams
- Evening bat weighting 9 grams