ii6 Cincinnati Society of Natural History. 



burrow I. A man told me he had seen a " chuck " go into the 

 hole (entrance) A yesterday, and had put a barrel over the 

 hole. To-day we observed the chuck had dug a hole under 

 the north side of the barrel, and we presumed he had gone 

 out through it, and were positive he would be frightened by 

 the barrel and would not have returned. Nevertheless, we 

 concluded to excavate. It was 2.40 o'clock when the first 

 digging began. Entrance A was quite near to the tree. The 

 burrow descended in a vertical direction, then continued in a 

 gradual descent to the point C, twenty-one and a half inches 

 below the surface, then ascended to point d, fifteen inches 

 b^low the surface. The general direction from A was nearly 

 straight, with a short bend from b to C. The burrow at d 

 bent back and ran in a north-westerly direction on a descend- 

 ing grade, which point was ten inches lower than point d. 

 At the point C, heretofore mentioned, a nest nine inches deep 

 lay to the north east of the runway. Between the point or 

 elbow d and the end g of the branch burrow, the latter was 

 filled with sand between points d and e. This did not deceive 

 us. We dug on and finally became aware of the vicinit}' of 

 an active marmot before us in the burrow; time, 3.05 p. m. 

 We sent for a bag, and upon its arrival proceeded to unearth 

 our subterraneous friend. Meantime he had disappeared. 



According to my best recollection, the marmot had dug and 

 passed across from e to the main burrow, and remained in a 

 part thereof, which I had not then opened from above. Not 

 finding him at e, we dug along in the main burrow from d 

 toward C. In the meantime he had filled the burrow imme- 

 diately in front of him (he faced toward d when we found 

 him) with sand. We spaded away his hole to within a couple 

 of inches of his nose, and thus made the hole open at the end 

 toward d. We then watched him. 



The manner in which this marmot and the marmot found 

 in excavation I filled or stopped the hole in front of him was 

 as follows : He sat or crouched in his hole, his nose facing 

 the aperture, and its tip some two inches from the edge of the 

 hole. See illustrative diagram sketch No. i. As nearly as I 

 could make out, he appeared to bring dirt by his hind paws 

 from within the burrow within reach of his front paws. With 

 the latter he banked this dirt in front, directlv across the 



