How many baby Townsend’s voles are in a litter?
A Townsend’s vole (Microtus townsendii) usually gives birth to around 5 babies.
Each of those little ones spend around 23 days as a fetus before they are released into the wild. Upon birth, they weight 1 grams (0 lbs) and measure 3.2 cm (0′ 2″). They are a member of the Muridae family (genus: Microtus). An adult Townsend’s vole grows up to a size of 13.8 cm (0′ 6″).
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.
Townsend’s vole (Microtus townsendii) is a species of rodent in the family Cricetidae, the sister species of M. canicaudus. It is found in temperate grasslands of British Columbia in Canada and in the states of Washington and Oregon in the United States.Greek root words for “small ear” are the source for the genus name Microtus. American naturalist and writer John Kirk Townsend collected the type specimen in 1835, which accounts for the second part of the name.
Other animals of the family Muridae
Townsend’s vole is a member of the Muridae, as are these animals:
- Red spiny rat with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Northern hopping mouse weighting only 38 grams
- Darien harvest mouse with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Reed vole with 5 babies per pregnancy
- Ungava collared lemming with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Northern red-backed vole with 5 babies per pregnancy
- Paramo hocicudo weighting only 41 grams
- Indian hairy-footed gerbil with 3 babies per pregnancy
- Melanomys zunigae weighting only 53 grams
- Oligoryzomys magellanicus weighting only 25 grams
Animals that share a litter size with Townsend’s vole
Those animals also give birth to 5 babies at once:
- Western quoll
- Northern red-backed vole
- Fringe-tailed gerbil
- Rufous mouse opossum
- Bobrinski’s jerboa
- Northwestern deer mouse
- Uinta ground squirrel
- Golden-mantled ground squirrel
- Eastern quoll
- Southern red-backed vole
Animals with the same weight as a Townsend’s vole
What other animals weight around 52 grams (0.11 lbs)?
- Temchuk’s bolo mouse weighting 47 grams
- Ungava collared lemming weighting 57 grams
- Gould’s mouse weighting 49 grams
- Peters’s striped mouse weighting 54 grams
- Demonic tube-nosed fruit bat weighting 53 grams
- Yellow-rumped leaf-eared mouse weighting 53 grams
- Great fruit-eating bat weighting 59 grams
- Yellow-footed antechinus weighting 44 grams
- Andean caenolestid weighting 47 grams
- Euryoryzomys nitidus weighting 55 grams
Animals with the same size as a Townsend’s vole
Also reaching around 13.8 cm (0′ 6″) in size do these animals:
- Blind mole gets as big as 12 cm (0′ 5″)
- Spectral tarsier gets as big as 12 cm (0′ 5″)
- Bush rat gets as big as 15.8 cm (0′ 7″)
- Colorado chipmunk gets as big as 12.2 cm (0′ 5″)
- San Quintin kangaroo rat gets as big as 12.9 cm (0′ 6″)
- Snow-footed Oldfield mouse gets as big as 12.1 cm (0′ 5″)
- Long-tailed Talaud mosaic-tailed rat gets as big as 15.2 cm (0′ 6″)
- Asian garden dormouse gets as big as 13.7 cm (0′ 6″)
- Water vole (North America) gets as big as 15.4 cm (0′ 7″)
- Buller’s chipmunk gets as big as 13.6 cm (0′ 6″)