Osman II

The gerbils , name Latin Gerbillinae Gray, 1825, form a subfamily of small Rongeur S of the family of the Muridé S. One gathers under the name “gerbil” 14 kinds distinct (see framed opposite), in particular the kinds Gerbillus and Meriones .

  • the kind Gerbillus , group of small rodents of the arid and desert regions of Africa and of the Close relation and the Middle East, comprises more than one about sixty species.

  • the kind Meriones includes/understands inter alia the Gerbille of Mongolia, Meriones unguiculatus (Milne-Edwards, 1867), that which one usually finds in the laboratories of biology and the animaleries under the shortened name of “gerbil”.

One should not confuse the gerbils with the Gerboise S which are not same family and which have a tail and back legs much longer compared to the size of the body.

List kinds

The species of gerbils are distributed in 14 kinds:

Biology

The species of gerbils are gregarious animals, which generally live in small groups in a wild state. The territory of a group, which can reach several hundred square meters, is centered on a deep burrow provided with many ramified galleries. The gerbils are animals Végétarien S (granivores) with tendency Omnivore.

Their physiology is adapted to particularly arid climatic conditions. The gerbils " économisent" water, drink little and urinate little. This characteristic supported their domestication.

Their hearing, very developed, enables them to locate the predatory ones like their congeneric among the group. This large gerbil is a tank of the bacillus of Yersin, Yersinia pestis , agent of the Peste transmitted by their Puce S. In the steppes of Mongolia, the gerbils are the independent source of food of the carnivores, in particular the birds of prey. So their life expectancy in a wild state hardly exceeds a year.

In Africa, potential reserves of diseases or ravageurs of cultures in the zones sahéliennes, the gerbils can be particularly harmful rodents, in particular when they pullulate. In 2002 began a scientific observation from the gerbils of Bushveld, in the south of the Africa, in “in [Ezemvelo Nature Reserve”, to study the possible propagation of the Peste by the chip S of these prolific animals.

In 2001 one highlighted the pollinating role of certain gerbils of the south of Africa like Gerbillurus paeba and Desmodillus auricularis . Fond of delicacies of the nectar of a variety of Hyacinthacées to the sheets pointing out curiously those of the water lilies, Massonia removed pressure from , they transport the Pollen on their muzzle which they plunge in the heart of the flowers.

In the Arabic Péninsule one classifies them in two categories:

  • gerbils of sands (psammophile), like the gerbil of Cheesman, Gerbillus cheesmani , which is characterized by solitary manners and the lower part from its legs covered from hairs. This characteristic is common to other mammals which live on sand, the such gerbil of Egypt, Gerbillus gerbillus , but also the starveling Renard, Vulpes rueppellii , and the Chat of sands, Felis margarita
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