What is the maximal age a Lesser mole-rat reaches?
An adult Lesser mole-rat (Nannospalax leucodon) usually gets as old as 4.5 years.
Lesser mole-rats are around 29 days in the womb of their mother. When born, they weight 5 grams (0.01 lbs) and measure 3.8 cm (0′ 2″). As a member of the Muridae family (genus: Nannospalax), a Lesser mole-rat caries out around 3 little ones per pregnancy, which happens around 1 times a year. Fully grown, they reach a bodylength of 50 cm (1′ 8″).
As a reference: Usually, humans get as old as 100 years, with the average being around 75 years. After being carried in the belly of their mother for 280 days (40 weeks), they grow to an average size of 1.65m (5′ 5″) and weight in at 62 kg (137 lbs), which is obviously highly individual.
The lesser mole-rat (Spalax leucodon) is a species of rodent in the family Spalacidae found in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Greece, Hungary, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro, Israel, Turkey, Iran and Ukraine. There have been suggestions that its taxonomic position should change in the light of new scientific information. Modern authors tend to separate this and some closely related mole rat species from other Spalax species by classifying them into a separate genus named Nannospalax. A cariological study showed that Nannospalax leucodon is a superspecies consisting of several cariologically distinct cryptic species. According to this definition there are four separate cariological forms in the Carpathian Basin, one of them endangered and another one vulnerable while insufficient data are available to evaluate the conservation status of the other two forms.
Animals of the same family as a Lesser mole-rat
Not really brothers and sisters, but from the same biological family (Muridae):
- Plains rat becoming 5.58 years old
- Hairy-eared cerrado mouse bringing the scale to 24 grams
- Manus Island mosaic-tailed rat bringing the scale to 144 grams
- Chihuahuan mouse bringing the scale to 40 grams
- Lataste’s gerbil with 4 babies per pregnancy
- Nayarit mouse bringing the scale to 40 grams
- Giant bushy-tailed cloud rat getting as big as 37.1 cm (1′ 3″)
- Mountain mosaic-tailed rat with 2 babies per pregnancy
- BolaƱos woodrat bringing the scale to 198 grams
- Mount Pirri isthmus rat with 2 babies per pregnancy
Animals that reach the same age as Lesser mole-rat
With an average age of 4.5 years, Lesser mole-rat are in good companionship of the following animals:
- Spinifex hopping mouse usually reaching 5.17 years
- Silky pocket mouse usually reaching 5 years
- Banded hare-wallaby usually reaching 4 years
- Northern pocket gopher usually reaching 3.75 years
- Giant golden mole usually reaching 4 years
- Meadow jumping mouse usually reaching 5 years
- Paucident planigale usually reaching 5 years
- Lesser mole-rat usually reaching 4.5 years
- Spix’s yellow-toothed cavy usually reaching 4.58 years
- European water vole usually reaching 5 years
Animals with the same number of babies Lesser mole-rat
The same number of babies at once (3) are born by:
- Ring-tailed ground squirrel
- Kivu long-haired shrew
- Texas pocket gopher
- Rock vole
- Molina’s grass mouse
- Ungava collared lemming
- South American coati
- Coruro
- White-ankled mouse
- Polynesian rat
Weighting as much as Lesser mole-rat
A fully grown Lesser mole-rat reaches around 189 grams (0.42 lbs). So do these animals:
- Southwestern water vole with 220 grams
- Sangihe tarsier with 165 grams
- Lesser mole-rat with 188 grams
- Tamaulipan woodrat with 198 grams
- Echigo mole with 163 grams
- Holochilus chacarius with 204 grams
- Maxomys baeodon with 159 grams
- Indian hedgehog with 171 grams
- Peters’s climbing rat with 182 grams
- Holochilus brasiliensis with 155 grams