Reproduction of the Echidna

Questions: How do Echidnas do their Mating? How and Where Do Echidnas Live? How Long are Echidnas' Tongues? What are the Echidnas' Main Enemies? How do Echidnas Escape Danger? What is the Average Lifespan of an Echidna? How Fast Can an Echidna Go? How Long are Echidnas' Burrows? What are the Different Species of Echidnas? Are Echidnas truly mammals?

Welcome Echidna mating involves the formation of mating trains, where groups of males will follow around a female during the mating season of July and August. Probably attracted by scent trails, as many as 8 males will stay with a female for up to 4 weeks. When the female is ready to mate, she lies flat on the ground with her front feet attached to a tree. The males wander in a circle around the tree and the female, occasionally prodding her with their snouts. The males slowly dig deep trenches around her with their claws. When the trench is complete, the males have a shoving contest, trying to push each other out of the trench, which can be 18 centametres or more in depth. The last male remaining mates with the female; mating can take an hour or more, the whole process five hours or more.After mating, there is approximately a 21 to 28 day gestation period before an egg is laid. During this period, the female prepares a nursery burrow, usually about 1 meter long, with an enlarged chamber, filled with grass and leaves at the end. When in use, the burrow entrance is plugged with dirt and well-hidden, making them almost impossible to find. After about 10 days, the Echidna hatchling emerges from the egg with the aid of both a single egg tooth and a carbuncle, a hard bump on its nose. Both the egg tooth and the carbuncle disappear after hatching, but the egg tooth is the only tooth any echidna ever has. The hatchling is semi-transparent and 13-14 millimeters long at birth. Pouch young grow quickly, and can reach 400 grams in 60 days. For obvious reasons, the pouch young is expelled from the pouch when its spines begin to come in, though there is no scientific agreement exactly at what age this occurs. The puggle then remains in the nursery burrow until between 180 and 240 days have passed since birth. Echidnas suckle their young for about 200 days. Once the young echidna leaves the pouch, it may be left alone in the nursery burrow without being fed for as much as 5 to 10 days at a time. As a result, they have to be able to eat a lot at one time, and young echidnas can eat 20% of their own body weight of milk in one go.