World Species : Desmodillus auricularis (Cape short-eared gerbil)

Animalia > Chordata > Mammalia > Rodentia > Muridae > Desmodillus > Desmodillus auricularis

Desmodillus auricularis (Cape short-eared gerbil)

Contents

Synonyms: Desmodillus auricularis pudicus; Gerbillus brevicaudatus (heterotypic)

Wikipedia Abstract

The Cape short-eared gerbil, Desmodillus auricularis, is a species of rodent in the family Muridae. It is the only species in the genus Desmodillus.It is found in Angola, Botswana, Namibia, and South Africa.Its natural habitats are hot deserts and temperate desert.

View Wikipedia Record: Desmodillus auricularis

EDGE Analysis

Uniqueness Scale: Similiar (0)

Unique (100)

Uniqueness & Vulnerability Scale: Similiar & Secure (0)

Unique & Vulnerable (100)

ED Score: 12.7

EDGE Score: 2.62

Learn more at EDGE of Existence programme

Attributes

Adult Weight ^[1]	55 grams
Birth Weight ^[1]	3 grams

Diet ^[2]	Carnivore (Invertebrates), Granivore
Diet - Invertibrates ^[2]	30 %
Diet - Seeds ^[2]	70 %
Forages - Ground ^[2]	100 %

Gestation ^[1]	29 days
Litter Size ^[1]	3
Maximum Longevity ^[1]	6 years
Nocturnal ^[2]	Yes
Snout to Vent Length ^[3]	5 inches (13 cm)
Weaning ^[1]	33 days

Ecoregions

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Name	Countries	Ecozone	Biome
Albany thickets	South Africa	Afrotropic	Mediterranean Forests, Woodlands, and Scrub
Angolan Mopane woodlands	Angola, Namibia	Afrotropic	Tropical and Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas, and Shrublands
Drakensberg montane grasslands, woodlands and forests	South Africa, Swaziland, Lesotho	Afrotropic	Montane Grasslands and Shrublands
Etosha Pan halophytics	Namibia	Afrotropic	Flooded Grasslands and Savannas
Highveld grasslands	South Africa	Afrotropic	Montane Grasslands and Shrublands
Kalahari Acacia-Baikiaea woodlands	Botswana, Namibia, Zimbabwe, South Africa	Afrotropic	Tropical and Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas, and Shrublands
Kalahari xeric savanna	Botswana, Namibia, South Africa	Afrotropic	Deserts and Xeric Shrublands
Kaokoveld desert	Namibia, Angola	Afrotropic	Deserts and Xeric Shrublands
Lowland fynbos and renosterveld	South Africa	Afrotropic	Mediterranean Forests, Woodlands, and Scrub
Montane fynbos and renosterveld	South Africa	Afrotropic	Mediterranean Forests, Woodlands, and Scrub
Nama Karoo	Namibia, South Africa	Afrotropic	Deserts and Xeric Shrublands
Namib desert	Namibia	Afrotropic	Deserts and Xeric Shrublands
Namibian savanna woodlands	Angola, Namibia	Afrotropic	Deserts and Xeric Shrublands
Southern Africa bushveld	Botswana, Zimbabwe, South Africa	Afrotropic	Tropical and Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas, and Shrublands
Succulent Karoo	Namibia, South Africa	Afrotropic	Deserts and Xeric Shrublands
Zambezian flooded grasslands	Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia	Afrotropic	Flooded Grasslands and Savannas
Zambezian halophytics	Mozambique, Botswana	Afrotropic	Flooded Grasslands and Savannas

Protected Areas

Name	IUCN Category	Area acres	Location
Etosha National Park	II	5699141	Namibia
Kalahari Gemsbok National Park	II	2382284	Northern Cape, South Africa
Namib-Naukluft National Park	II	12585619	Namibia
Richtersveld National Park	II	399195	Northern Cape, South Africa
Skeleton Coast Game Park	II	4168395	Namibia

Ecosystems

Namib Desert

Biodiversity Hotspots

Name	Location	Endemic
Cape Floristic Region	South Africa	No
Maputaland-Pondoland-Albany	Mozambique, South Africa, Swaziland	No
Succulent Karoo	Namibia, South Africa	No

Prey / Diet

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Prey / Diet Overlap

Competing Species	Common Prey Count
Micaelamys namaquensis (Rock mouse)	1

Predators

Hyaena brunnea (Brown Hyena)

^[5]

Consumers

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Range Map

External References

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ ¹de Magalhaes, J. P., and Costa, J. (2009) A database of vertebrate longevity records and their relation to other life-history traits. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 22(8):1770-1774
♦ ²Hamish Wilman, Jonathan Belmaker, Jennifer Simpson, Carolina de la Rosa, Marcelo M. Rivadeneira, and Walter Jetz. 2014. EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals. Ecology 95:2027
♦ ³Nathan P. Myhrvold, Elita Baldridge, Benjamin Chan, Dhileep Sivam, Daniel L. Freeman, and S. K. Morgan Ernest. 2015. An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96:3109
♦ ⁴Jorrit H. Poelen, James D. Simons and Chris J. Mungall. (2014). Global Biotic Interactions: An open infrastructure to share and analyze species-interaction datasets. Ecological Informatics.
♦ ⁵The Namib: Detritus and Fog Dependence Scott Christy March 1st, 2006
♦ ⁶International Flea Database

Ecoregions provided by World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF). WildFinder: Online database of species distributions, ver. 01.06 Wildfinder Database

Biodiversity Hotspots provided by Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund

Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License

Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0