AnAge entry for Gerbilliscus afra
Classification (HAGRID: 03033)
- Taxonomy
-
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia (Taxon entry)
Order: Rodentia
Family: Muridae
Genus: Gerbilliscus
- Species
- Gerbilliscus afra
- Common name
- Cape gerbil
- Synonyms
- Tatera afra, Gerbillus africanus, Meriones caffer, Meriones schlegelii, Tatera afra gilli
Lifespan, ageing, and relevant traits
- Maximum longevity
- 5.7 years (captivity)
- Source
- ref. 671
- Sample size
- Small
- Data quality
- Acceptable
- Observations
One specimen lived 5.7 years in captivity [0671]. Age at sexual maturity largely depends on the season of birth [0455].
Life history traits (averages)
- Female sexual maturity
- 152 days
- Male sexual maturity
- 115 days
- Gestation
- 23 days
- Weaning
- Litter size
- 3.9 (viviparous)
- Litters per year
- 6.5
- Inter-litter interval
- Weight at birth
- 4.5 g
- Weight at weaning
- Adult weight
- 74.8 g
- Postnatal growth rate
- Maximum longevity residual
- 60%
Metabolism
- Typical body temperature
- 307ºK or 34.0ºC or 93.2ºF
- Basal metabolic rate
- 1.0160 W
- Body mass
- 106.5 g
- Metabolic rate per body mass
- 0.009540 W/g
References
- [0978] Jones et al. (2009), PanTHERIA: a species-level database of life history, ecology, and geography of extant and recently extinct mammals
- [0671] Richard Weigl (2005), Longevity of Mammals in Captivity; from the Living Collections of the World
- [0036] Savage et al. (2004), The predominance of quarter-power scaling in biology
- [0420] White and Seymour (2003), Mammalian basal metabolic rate is proportional to body mass2/3 (PubMed)
- [0610] Ernest (2003), Life history characteristics of placental non-volant mammals
- [0434] Ronald Nowak (1999), Walker's Mammals of the World
- [0455] Virginia Hayssen et al. (1993), Asdell's Patterns of Mammalian Reproduction: A Compendium of Species-Specific Data
External Resources
- Integrated Taxonomic Information System
- ITIS 970786
- Animal Diversity Web
- ADW account (if available)
- Encyclopaedia of Life
- Search EOL
- NCBI Taxonomy
- Entrez
- Search all databases
- Ageing Literature
- Search Google Scholar or Search PubMed
- Images
- Google Image search
- Internet
- Search Google