8 



ITORTH AMEEICAK FAUNA. 



[No. 37. 



name '^wenusk'^ is generally used. In southern Virginia^ as I am 

 informed by Edward A. Preble, the woodchuck is locally known as 

 ''moonack/^ which is probably a corruption of the original name 

 '^monax'^ used by both Catesby and Edwards. 



The yellow-footed marmots (flaviventris group) are commonly 

 called woodchucks or rockchucks, more rarely ground hogs or marmots. 



The hoary marmots {coligata group) are most often known as 

 ground hogs, whistlers or '^siffleurs/' sometimes as whisthng '^pigs/^ 

 whistling marmots, or ''badgers." 



HABITS. 



The eastern woodchucks live for the most part in pairs or family 

 groups, the yellow-footed marmots in more or less scattered colonies, 

 while the hoary marmots are more strongly gregarious. All the 

 species hve in burrows which they dig for themselves. In regions 

 where rock piles, rock ledges, or stone waUs occur the burrows are 

 usually excavated underneath or among rocks, but natural openings 

 in cHffs are often utilized for dens. 



Eastern woodchucks (monax group), while preferring rocky bluffs 

 or stone waUs for a habitation, often live in meadows devoid of rocks 

 and where the burrows are surrounded by an abundant growth of 

 grass or clover. 



Yellow-footed marmots (flaviventris group) usually live either on 

 rocky hillsides, in the crevices of cliffs, or beneath rock piles in 

 meadows. They frequently make their burrows beneath unoccupied 

 buildings, but are never found far from hiUs, and are often abundant 

 in the higher parts of mountains. 



Hoary marmots (caligata group), when living at timber line in the 

 mountains, as is their invariable habit in the southern part of their 

 range, are always found in or about rock slides, but in Alaska and 

 northern British Columbia, where they frequently descend to low 

 altitudes, they often make their burrows in grassy flats or on open 

 hillsides. 



All the species are mainly terrestrial, but the eastern woodchucks 

 occasionally climb into trees and bushes. They are not at home, 

 however, in such situations, and as a rule may easily be dislodged. 

 The tree-cHmbing habit appears to be more strongly marked in the 

 woodchucks of the Mississippi VaUey than in those inhabiting the 

 Atlantic States. Charles Aldrich, of Webster City, Iowa, has re- 

 corded an instance of a woodchuck ascending an oak tree to a height 

 of 40 feet,^ and Dr. F. W. Langdon states that in Ohio he has seen 

 one descend the perpendicular trunk of a large sugar maple, liead 

 first? In Minnesota and Wisconsin, as I am informed by Vernon 



1 Aldrich, Charles. Am. Naturalist, XV, 1881, p. 737. 



2 Langdon, F. W. Journ. Cincinnati Soc. Nat. Hist., Ill, 1880, p. 305. 



