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ears are large, rounded, thinly haired, generally gray, but varying in the 
darker specimens to brownish-gray, pass ng into black at the extremi- 
ties. Tail full, rounded, and bushy, with the hairs generally eonsidera- 
bly less than half the length of the head and body. Specimens from the 
same locality vary greatly in color, the gray above from waitish to yel- 
lowish, the black from brownish-black to pure black, and the fulvous 
from pule to yellowish. The abundant soft under fur is black or dusky 
at base, then fulvous, passing into brownish-fulvous. Young specimens 
are much lighter colored than adults, and the pelage generally thinner. 
Habits and Habitat—The Woodchuck is a strictly herbivorous animal. 
Of cultivated crops it is particularly fond of peas and clover, sometimes 
making its burrow in a clover field. It is also foud of corn and other 
grain, leaves and buds. It naturally inhabits woods, as the Spermophiles 
do open prairies; like these it leaves its burrows with great caution, and 
only for a short distance. Althongh burrowing at times in open fields, 
its favorite resort is in wooded rocky blufts along the banks of streams; 
often it burrows under logs, brush heaps, or old fences. It produces from 
four to six young in the early part of summer; these leave the mother 
before fall, dig their burrows, and shift for themselves. They are not 
gregarious; they bibernate through the winter. Mr. Kennicott, from 
whose writings this account of their habits is mainly drawn, states that 
he has often found a number of them taking refuge in hollow trees, enter- 
ing a hole at the ground, and climbing up the cavity after the manner of 
the gray rabbit. Their gait is a series of short and awkward jumps, much 
like that of a clumsy pig; a man can readily overtake them. They are 
cautious while feeding, often standing erect, with out-stretched neck, on 
the alert for danger. , 
The fur is of no value; the hide is tough, and used for lashes, pouches, 
and thongs among the backwoodsmen. ; 
Mr. Kennicott states that when fat, which they usually are in autumn, 
Woodchucks are esteemed by some good eating. Such an one, I take it, 
was Thoreau’s Canadian woodchopper, “a true Homeric or Paphiagonian 
man,” he tells us, who “can hole fifty posts a day, and make his supper 
on a woodchuck which his dog caught.” “Frequently he would leave 
his dinner in the bushes, when his dog had caught a woodchuck by the 
way, and go back a mile and a half to dress it, and leave it in the cellar 
of the house where he boarded. He was so gentle and unsophisticated 
that no introduction would serve to introduce him, more than if. you in- 
troduced a woodchuck to your neighbor.” 
How this Walden neighbor cooked his Mierittbnll Thoreau. does not 
