July 18, 2012; Hayden Valley, Yellowstone National Park.
From Wikipedia: Marmots are generally large
ground squirrels in the
genus Marmota, of which there are 15 species. Those most often referred to as marmots tend to live in mountainous areas, such as the
Alps, northern
Apennines, Eurasian steppes,
Carpathians,
Tatras, and
Pyrenees in Europe and northwestern Asia; the
Rocky Mountains,
Black Hills, Cascades, and
Sierra Nevada in
North America; and the
Deosai Plateau in
Pakistan and
Ladakh in
India. The
groundhog, however, is also sometimes called a marmot, while the similarly sized, but more social,
prairie dog is not classified in the genus
Marmota but in the related genus
Cynomys.
Marmots typically live in
burrows (often within rockpiles, particularly in the case of the
yellow-bellied marmot), and
hibernate there through the winter. Most marmots are highly social and use loud whistles to communicate with one another, especially when alarmed.
Marmots mainly eat greens and many types of
grasses, berries,
lichens,
mosses,
roots and
flowers.
