It is hard to guess what a Northern short-tailed shrew weights. But we have the answer:
An adult Northern short-tailed shrew (Blarina brevicauda) on average weights 18 grams (0.04 lbs).
The Northern short-tailed shrew is from the family Soricidae (genus: Blarina). They can live for up to 2.75 years. When reaching adult age, they grow up to 12.1 cm (0′ 5″). On average, Northern short-tailed shrews can have babies 3 times per year with a litter size of 5.
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 northern short-tailed shrew (Blarina brevicauda) is the largest shrew in the genus Blarina, and occurs in the northeastern region of North America. It is a semifossorial, highly active, and voracious insectivore and is present in a variety of habitats like broadleaved and pine forests among shrubs and hedges as well as grassy river banks. It is notable in that it is one of the few venomous mammals. The specific epithet, brevicauda, is a combination of the Latin brevis and cauda, meaning “short tail”.
Animals of the same family as a Northern short-tailed shrew
We found other animals of the Soricidae family:
- Reddish-gray musk shrew with a weight of 8 grams
- Goldman’s broad-clawed shrew with a weight of 6 grams
- Verapaz shrew with a weight of 7 grams
- Long-tailed brown-toothed shrew with a size of 6.6 cm (0′ 3″)
- Madagascan pygmy shrew with a weight of 2 grams
- Chestnut-bellied shrew with a weight of 7 grams
- Geata mouse shrew with a weight of 9 grams
- Johnston’s forest shrew with a weight of 3 grams
- Savanna path shrew with a weight of 16 grams
- Nigerian shrew with a weight of 23 grams
Animals with the same weight as a Northern short-tailed shrew
As a comparison, here are some other animals that weight as much as the Blarina brevicauda:
- Woermann’s bat bringing 16 grams to the scale
- Common blossom bat bringing 17 grams to the scale
- Desert long-eared bat bringing 21 grams to the scale
- Lesser short-tailed gerbil bringing 17 grams to the scale
- Lesser red musk shrew bringing 15 grams to the scale
- Northern red-backed vole bringing 19 grams to the scale
- Pygmy fruit bat bringing 15 grams to the scale
- Southern red-backed vole bringing 19 grams to the scale
- Davis’s round-eared bat bringing 20 grams to the scale
- Ghost-faced bat bringing 16 grams to the scale
Animals with the same size as a Northern short-tailed shrew
Not that size really matters, but it makes things comparable. So here are a couple of animals that are as big as Northern short-tailed shrew:
- Van Deusen’s rat with a size of 13.5 cm (0′ 6″)
- Thomas’s mosaic-tailed rat with a size of 14.3 cm (0′ 6″)
- Web-footed tenrec with a size of 14.5 cm (0′ 6″)
- Rusty-bellied brush-furred rat with a size of 11.8 cm (0′ 5″)
- Mitchell’s hopping mouse with a size of 11.3 cm (0′ 5″)
- Broad-striped tube-nosed fruit bat with a size of 12.1 cm (0′ 5″)
- Sclater’s golden mole with a size of 10 cm (0′ 4″)
- Angolan rousette with a size of 10.5 cm (0′ 5″)
- Guajira mouse opossum with a size of 13.1 cm (0′ 6″)
- Cave nectar bat with a size of 12.4 cm (0′ 5″)
Animals with the same litter size as a Northern short-tailed shrew
Here is a list of animals that have the same number of babies per litter (5) as a Northern short-tailed shrew:
- Wongai ningaui
- Olive-backed pocket mouse
- Siberian large-toothed shrew
- Norway lemming
- Gray marmot
- Sandhill dunnart
- Tate’s woolly mouse opossum
- Caucasian snow vole
- Cliff chipmunk
- Lesser hedgehog tenrec
Animals with the same life expectancy as a Northern short-tailed shrew
Completely different animals, but becoming as old as a Northern short-tailed shrew:
- Golden mouse with an average maximal age of 2.5 years
- Highland streaked tenrec with an average maximal age of 2.58 years
- Narrow-nosed planigale with an average maximal age of 3 years
- Dibbler with an average maximal age of 3 years
- Kultarr with an average maximal age of 3.25 years
- Brazilian spiny tree-rat with an average maximal age of 3.08 years
- Northern pygmy mouse with an average maximal age of 3.25 years
- Monito del monte with an average maximal age of 3.17 years
- Brants’s climbing mouse with an average maximal age of 3.25 years
- Ooldea dunnart with an average maximal age of 3 years