ARCTOMYS MONAX. 241 



hay is cut in July, while there are a few that never abandon their 

 forest homes. But few reside permanently in the open fields.* 



The Woodchuck is our most remarkable example of a hibernating 

 mammal. He lays up no store of provision, but remains dormant 

 throughout the winter. Neither temperature nor quantity of food 

 at hand has to do with the beginning of his voluntary seclusion. 



The first copious rains that fall after haying is over cause fresh 

 green grass to spring up anew upon the meadows. This second crop, 

 termed rowen or aftermath, usually attains a luxuriant growth by 

 the latter part of August. In many places it consists largely of 

 red clover (Trifoliiun pratense), the favorite food of the Wood- 

 chuck. And this animal eats so much during the month previous 

 to his withdrawal into the earth that he becomes .exceedingly fat, 

 and proportionally inert, and is therefore in excellent condition for 

 hibernating-. Alon^r the western border of the Adirondacks he 



o o 



usually goes into winter-quarters between the i8th and 25th of 

 September, not to reappear till the middle or latter part of March. 

 It is indeed a curious coincidence that the limits of the dormant 

 state should so closely correspond with the periods of the equi- 

 noxes. In nine cases out of ten he disappears, with astonishing 

 precision, within a few days of the autumnal equinox, and remains 

 under ground till about the time the sun cuts the plane of the 

 equator at the vernal equinox, f 



* It may not be amiss toacquiint my readers with the reasons that lead me to believe that the 

 majority of our Wooclchucks desert the meadows in autumn and hibernate in burrows in the woods. 

 There are two principal facts, either of which is sufficient, in my opinion, to establish the existence 

 of this habit. First : As will be hereafter sh nvn. Wooclchucks, in this region, com; out from thei r 

 burrows in early spring two or three weeks before the disappearance of the sno\v, and may easily 

 be tracked to their holes. Now it has been my experience (an experience covering at least fifteen 

 years) that fully ()') per cent, of tho.e that appear before the snow goes in spring, come from holes 

 in the woods. Second : In the fall of the year I have opened a number of meadow burrows, 

 which I knew were inhabited up to a week of the time when the animals went into winter- 

 quarters in September, and almost without exception such burrows have been found to be 

 tenantless. 



f To this rule there are, of course, exceptions, but they are not sufficiently frequent to in any 

 way invalidate the accuracy of the above general statement. During very warm weather it some- 

 times happens that a Woodchuck maybe seen sunning himself at the mouth of his hole for an hour 

 or two in the hottest part of the afternoon as late as the first of October, but such instances are 



