How does the Tasmanian devil have babies?

Answer 1

Being mammals, Tasmanian devils reproduce sexually. They mate continuously for up to five days; they actually copulate for 15 seconds then take a break of 20 minutes. Tasmanian devils reproduce just once a year. They tend to mate in March and give birth in April, but this time can extend over several months, with not all Tasmanian devils giving birth at the same time. The gestation period of the Tasmanian Devil is about 21 days.

The average number of Tasmanian Devil babies, or joeys, that a mother may be rearing at any one time is 2-3. A female Tasmanian devil actually may have several dozen tiny embryos in one birth - anywhere between 20 and 40 - but only four at most can latch onto a teat in the mother's pouch. The rest are lost as, once a joey is born, it must compete with the other joeys in the litter to determine which ones will enter into the backwards-opening pouch of the mother.

Those that survive are attached to the teat for about three months. At around 105 days old, they leave the pouch for the first time, and do not return. They stay in the den for about three more months, leave the den more and more often, and are independent at about seven or eight months old.