It is hard to guess what a Red-legged sun squirrel weights. But we have the answer:
An adult Red-legged sun squirrel (Heliosciurus rufobrachium) on average weights 333 grams (0.73 lbs).
The Red-legged sun squirrel is from the family Sciuridae (genus: Heliosciurus). They can live for up to 8.83 years. When reaching adult age, they grow up to 23.8 cm (0′ 10″). Usually, Red-legged sun squirrels have 2 babies per litter.
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 red-legged sun squirrel (Heliosciurus rufobrachium) is a species of rodent in the family Sciuridae, also commonly known as the crab-eating mongoose and the isabelline red-legged sun squirrel. It is native to tropical western and central Africa where its range extends from Senegal in the west, through Nigeria and the Republic of Congo to Uganda and Tanzania in the east. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests and moist savanna. This species is thought to be common and has a very wide distribution, so the International Union for Conservation of Nature has rated its conservation status as being of “least concern”.
Animals of the same family as a Red-legged sun squirrel
We found other animals of the Sciuridae family:
- Alexander’s bush squirrel with a weight of 50 grams
- Alpine marmot bringing 4.06 kilos (8.95 lbs) to the scale
- Epixerus ebii wilsoni with a weight of 422 grams
- Arizona gray squirrel with a weight of 647 grams
- San Joaquin antelope squirrel with a weight of 160 grams
- Harris’s antelope squirrel with a weight of 127 grams
- Andean squirrel with a weight of 803 grams
- Brooke’s squirrel with a weight of 114 grams
- Amazon dwarf squirrel with a weight of 92 grams
- Javanese flying squirrel with a weight of 156 grams
Animals with the same weight as a Red-legged sun squirrel
As a comparison, here are some other animals that weight as much as the Heliosciurus rufobrachium:
- Emily’s tuco-tuco bringing 285 grams to the scale
- Smoky pocket gopher bringing 302 grams to the scale
- Short-tailed spiny rat bringing 285 grams to the scale
- Kinabalu squirrel bringing 324 grams to the scale
- White-tailed olalla rat bringing 274 grams to the scale
- Montane bamboo rat bringing 382 grams to the scale
- Pygmy slow loris bringing 343 grams to the scale
- Allen’s woodrat bringing 368 grams to the scale
- Napo spiny rat bringing 285 grams to the scale
- Coquerel’s giant mouse lemur bringing 326 grams to the scale
Animals with the same size as a Red-legged sun squirrel
Not that size really matters, but it makes things comparable. So here are a couple of animals that are as big as Red-legged sun squirrel:
- Cape dune mole-rat with a size of 27.9 cm (0′ 11″)
- Yellow-bellied weasel with a size of 26 cm (0′ 11″)
- Lowland ringtail possum with a size of 22.3 cm (0′ 9″)
- Mindanao squirrel with a size of 21 cm (0′ 9″)
- Ihering’s Atlantic spiny rat with a size of 19.7 cm (0′ 8″)
- North African hedgehog with a size of 21.4 cm (0′ 9″)
- Peruvian tuco-tuco with a size of 23.8 cm (0′ 10″)
- Mindanao treeshrew with a size of 19.5 cm (0′ 8″)
- Peters’s squirrel with a size of 26.8 cm (0′ 11″)
- Gunnison’s prairie dog with a size of 27.9 cm (0′ 11″)
Animals with the same litter size as a Red-legged sun squirrel
Here is a list of animals that have the same number of babies per litter (2) as a Red-legged sun squirrel:
- Saiga antelope
- Tolai hare
- Chiruromys lamia
- Dark-footed mouse shrew
- Peters’s climbing rat
- Red tree vole
- Calamian deer
- Southern pig-footed bandicoot
- Eastern harvest mouse
- Marine otter
Animals with the same life expectancy as a Red-legged sun squirrel
Completely different animals, but becoming as old as a Red-legged sun squirrel:
- Jamaican coney with an average maximal age of 8.25 years
- California leaf-nosed bat with an average maximal age of 10.33 years
- Chinese ferret-badger with an average maximal age of 10.5 years
- Red-tailed chipmunk with an average maximal age of 8 years
- Florida mouse with an average maximal age of 7.33 years
- Plains viscacha with an average maximal age of 9.33 years
- Striped possum with an average maximal age of 9.58 years
- Greater hedgehog tenrec with an average maximal age of 10.5 years
- Central American agouti with an average maximal age of 10 years
- Fishing cat with an average maximal age of 10 years