It is hard to guess what a Camas pocket gopher weights. But we have the answer:
An adult Camas pocket gopher (Thomomys bulbivorus) on average weights 360 grams (0.79 lbs).
The Camas pocket gopher is from the family Geomyidae (genus: Thomomys). It is usually born with about 6 grams (0.01 lbs). When reaching adult age, they grow up to 19.9 cm (0′ 8″). On average, Camas pocket gophers can have babies 1 times per year with a litter size of 4.
As a reference: An average human weights in at 62 kg (137 lbs) and reaches an average size of 1.65m (5′ 5″). Humans spend 280 days (40 weeks) in the womb of their mother and reach around 75 years of age.
The camas pocket gopher (Thomomys bulbivorus), also known as the camas rat or Willamette Valley gopher, is a rodent, the largest member in the genus Thomomys, of the family Geomyidae. First described in 1829, it is endemic to the Willamette Valley of northwestern Oregon in the United States. The herbivorous gopher forages for vegetable and plant matter, which it collects in large, fur-lined, external cheek pouches. Surplus food is hoarded in an extensive system of tunnels. The dull-brown-to-lead-gray coat changes color and texture over the year. The mammal’s characteristically large, protuberant incisors are well adapted for use in tunnel construction, particularly in the hard clay soils of the Willamette Valley. The gophers make chattering sounds with their teeth; males and females make purring (or crooning) sounds when they are together, and the young make twittering sounds. Born toothless, blind and hairless, the young grow rapidly before being weaned at about six weeks of age.Although the camas pocket gopher is fiercely defensive when cornered, it may become tame in captivity. While population trends are generally stable, threats to the species’ survival include urbanization, habitat conversion for agricultural use and active attempts at eradication with trapping and poisons. It is prey for raptors and carnivorous mammals, and host to several parasitic arthropods and worms. Scientists believe that the gopher’s evolutionary history was disrupted when the Missoula Floods washed over the Willamette Valley at the end of the last ice age. The floods almost completely inundated its geographic range, which may have caused a genetic bottleneck as survivors repopulated the region after the waters receded.
Animals of the same family as a Camas pocket gopher
We found other animals of the Geomyidae family:
- Smoky pocket gopher with a weight of 302 grams
- Underwood’s pocket gopher with a weight of 250 grams
- Knox Jones’s pocket gopher with a weight of 172 grams
- Oaxacan pocket gopher with a weight of 499 grams
- Smoky pocket gopher with a weight of 150 grams
- Texas pocket gopher with a weight of 397 grams
- Variable pocket gopher with a weight of 615 grams
- Central Texas pocket gopher with a size of 16.5 cm (0′ 7″)
- Wyoming pocket gopher with 6 babies per litter
- Chiriqui pocket gopher with a weight of 650 grams
Animals with the same weight as a Camas pocket gopher
As a comparison, here are some other animals that weight as much as the Thomomys bulbivorus:
- Montane bamboo rat bringing 382 grams to the scale
- Bunker’s woodrat bringing 375 grams to the scale
- Colombian soft-furred spiny rat bringing 394 grams to the scale
- White-winged flying fox bringing 343 grams to the scale
- Smoky pocket gopher bringing 302 grams to the scale
- Madagascan fruit bat bringing 296 grams to the scale
- Sulawesi naked-backed fruit bat bringing 301 grams to the scale
- Big-eared flying fox bringing 365 grams to the scale
- Long-tailed giant rat bringing 349 grams to the scale
- Ruwenzori sun squirrel bringing 291 grams to the scale
Animals with the same size as a Camas pocket gopher
Not that size really matters, but it makes things comparable. So here are a couple of animals that are as big as Camas pocket gopher:
- Hispid cotton rat with a size of 16.7 cm (0′ 7″)
- Uinta ground squirrel with a size of 21.9 cm (0′ 9″)
- Papuan bandicoot with a size of 19.3 cm (0′ 8″)
- Yucatan squirrel with a size of 23.6 cm (0′ 10″)
- Fat-tailed dwarf lemur with a size of 22.5 cm (0′ 9″)
- European hedgehog with a size of 23.7 cm (0′ 10″)
- Striped treeshrew with a size of 18.5 cm (0′ 8″)
- Northern pika with a size of 16 cm (0′ 7″)
- Royle’s pika with a size of 17.7 cm (0′ 7″)
- Luzon striped rat with a size of 17.3 cm (0′ 7″)
Animals with the same litter size as a Camas pocket gopher
Here is a list of animals that have the same number of babies per litter (4) as a Camas pocket gopher: