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The Arctic ground squirrel typically has a beige-tan pelage with a lightly-spotted backside. Similar to the related prairie dog, it has a shorter face than the typical arboreal squirrels–due to its lifestyle of burrowing–as well as smaller ears, with a dark tail and white markings around the eyes.
The gestation period for a grey squirrel is 44 days. The female typically gives birth to 2-4 babies. Grey squirrels don’t hibernate, but they don’t need to.
The burrow may be 15 to 20 feet (4.6 to 6.1 metres) long, with several side passages. Most of the burrow is within one to two feet (about half a meter) of the surface, with only the hibernation nest in a special deeper section. Shorter burrows are dug as hiding places. This ground squirrel's home range is two to three acres (0.8 to 1.2 ha).
The distributions of the other species — the spotted ground squirrel and the Rio Grande ground squirrel — overlap that of the thirteen-lined ground squirrel in the south and west of our region.
Hibernation functions to conserve energy when sufficient food is not available. To achieve this energy saving, an endothermic animal decreases its metabolic rate and thereby its body temperature. [3] Hibernation may last days, weeks, or months—depending on the species, ambient temperature, time of year, and the individual's body-condition.
Urocitellus is a genus of ground squirrels.They were previously believed to belong to the much larger genus Spermophilus, but DNA sequencing of the cytochrome b gene showed that this group was paraphyletic to the prairie dogs and marmots, [2] [3] and could therefore no longer be retained as a single genus.
The body mass ranges from 1.9 to 8 kg (4.2–17.6 lb), with the animals being significantly lighter in the spring (just after hibernation) than in the autumn (just before hibernation). [ 6 ] [ 7 ] The alpine marmot is sometimes considered the heaviest squirrel species, although some other marmot species have a similar weight range, making it ...
The northern Idaho ground squirrel has an 8-month hibernation period from August to late April. Their diet consists of mostly forbs, grasses, shrubs, trees, rushes, and sedges. [4] The squirrel's active season is from April to July, and then the species spends the rest of the year hibernating. [12]