AnAge entry for Mustela nivalis
Classification (HAGRID: 02198)
- Taxonomy
-
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia (Taxon entry)
Order: Carnivora
Family: Mustelidae
Genus: Mustela
- Species
- Mustela nivalis
- Common name
- Least weasel
Lifespan, ageing, and relevant traits
- Maximum longevity
- 9.1 years (captivity)
- Source
- ref. 671
- Sample size
- Small
- Data quality
- Acceptable
- Observations
One wild born specimen was still alive at 9.1 years of age [0671]. Anecdotal reports of animals living more than 10 years are plausible but remain unverified.
Life history traits (averages)
- Female sexual maturity
- 120 days
- Male sexual maturity
- 120 days
- Gestation
- 36 days
- Weaning
- 39 days
- Litter size
- 5 (viviparous)
- Litters per year
- 1.5
- Inter-litter interval
- 200 days
- Weight at birth
- 2.6 g
- Weight at weaning
- 43.5 g
- Adult weight
- 46.9 g
- Postnatal growth rate
- 0.0546 days-1 (from Gompertz function)
- Maximum longevity residual
- 103%
Metabolism
No information on metabolism is available.
References
- [0671] Richard Weigl (2005), Longevity of Mammals in Captivity; from the Living Collections of the World
- [0730] Smith et al. (2003), Body mass of late Quaternary 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
- [0731] Zullinger et al. (1984), Fitting sigmoid equations to mammalian growth curves
External Resources
- Integrated Taxonomic Information System
- ITIS 180554
- Animal Diversity Web
- ADW account
- Encyclopaedia of Life
- Search EOL
- NCBI Taxonomy
- Taxonomy ID 36239
- Entrez
- Search all databases
- Ageing Literature
- Search Google Scholar or Search PubMed
- Images
- Google Image search
- Internet
- Search Google