Marmot, that is:
We saw this fellow as we were leaving Yellowstone National Park on Wednesday.
From Wikipedia:
The yellow-bellied marmot (Marmota flaviventris), also known as the rock chuck, is a ground squirrel in the marmot genus.
Yellow-bellied marmots usually weigh between 5 and 11 pounds (2 and 5 kg) when fully grown. They get fatter in the fall just before hibernating.
The yellow-bellied marmot lives in the western United States and southwestern Canada, including the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada. It inhabits steppes, meadows, talus fields and other open habitats, sometimes on the edge of deciduous or coniferous forests, and typically above 6,500 feet (2,000 m) of elevation.
Their territory is about 4 to 7 acres (2 to 3 ha) around a number of summer burrows. Marmots choose to dig burrows under rocks because predators are less likely to see their burrow. Predators include wolves, foxes, and coyotes. When a marmot sees a predator, it whistles to warn all other marmots in the area (giving it the nickname "whistle pig"). Then it typically hides in a nearby rock pile.
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Also yellow-necked. Appropriate for Yellowstone. Cute! Looks wary.
This fellow reminds me of some marmots we saw in Rocky Mountain National Park years ago. My mental picture of them is still vivid.,,they clearly caught my fancy!
he looks like he’s got a mean eye….for a yellow-bellied marmot
Dot – They usually are very wary, but in this instance it seemed as though he was posing.
Jean – We’ve seen a few this trip and at Rocky Mountain last year, but I’ve never been able to get any good shots of them until now.
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