I saw another critter!!!

[theworm[$]]

Woo Hoo!
I don't know what they are, but I like them!

The first day we were here, we went to the store and I drove Brian past my job. On the way out, I saw a critter. I have no idea what it was. I decided it was a badger - then I realized, I don't know what a badger is. Brian didn't see it, but said it could be a beaver. It did look somewhat beaverish, but it was BIG and Fierce looking, and fat and had spikey fur. I made Brian turn the truck around but by the time we got back there he was waddling away and all I saw was his fat rump.

I called Sara. She and Chip said it could be a groundhog, but it was quite big - larger than I thought groundhogs are.

Well tonight, I came home and there was one across the street! It was Cute!!! This one didn't look fierce. I took a photo with my cell phone, but was too far away to get it (I'm sure there is a zoom on the camera but I don't know how to use it). I called Brian and told him to come out but not to scare him. He did get scared though and went in the culvert under the driveway (is a pipe under driveways a culvert?)

Anyway. I like the critters!!!

[theworm[$]]

This is a badger - NO - it wasn't like this.

this is a beaver. The one today was not a beaver, but the first one might have been - but it was bigger than this.

groundhog - the one I saw today, I think was a groundhog. The first one was MUCH bigger and more fierce looking and spikey - and FAT!

[lynnzop[$]]

you won't like them so much when they start destroying the lawn.

are you sure it wasn't a burrito? they have spikes.

[mjfrombuffalo[$]]

Groundhogs can get really big. What's the difference between a groundhog and a gopher, anyway?

[theworm[$]]

gopher - I didn't look up Gophers....

[theworm[$]]

Gophers are CUTE!!!!!

[jgibson2[$]]

Spiky? Was it a porcupine?

[theworm[$]]

not that kind of spikey - its fur was very very thick and kind of punk-rock-like.

[hadassahchana[$]]

Ah- punk-rock like means groundhog. I heart heart heart groundhogs!


The freeway embankment by where the boys used to go to school had a huge colony of groundhogs, and the alpha male always sat at the top of the hill under a crabapple tree just watching traffic. I still sometimes drive over there just to make sure he's still there. Did I mention that I love groundhogs?

And somehow I doubt that you have beavers in your neighbourhood, unless you forgot to tell us about the creek and aspen trees running accross your property.

[taurusmoon]

This is the other thing I thought it might be:



Woodchuck.

If a woodchuck could chuck wood, how much wood would he chuck?

[taurusmoon]

Hey, I just learned that groundhogs and woodchucks were the same critter.

I'm probably doubly right.

[eris esoteric]

*snicker*

Sorry, woodchucks just crack me up.

And it's good you didn't see a badger. You don't need no steenkin' badgers.

[thinkerlady[$]]

I didn't know that Sara!! I have a groundhog nation living under my deck and in the tree line behind my house. They get quite big.

[theworm[$]]

groundhogs and woodchucks are the same????

Ok, so it was a groundchuck. A BIG SUPER DOOPER FAT Groundchuck

[drmomentum[$]]

Groundhogs ... we call 'em woodchucks around here. They're a kind of ground squirrel. Marmota monax. One of my favorite sciurids!

I saw them often around campus ... when I was on campus. I miss 'em.

We had some living in a big dirt mound in our yard a few years ago. They dig burrows.

(they're really cute when moving around.)

-JP

[thinkerlady[$]]

And they EAT daffodils. When we lived in our other house one of them chowed down on my daffodil patch, ate about 20 of the blooms. I wasn't happy.

[drmomentum[$]]

[theworm[$]]

I never lived near them before! I like them. And I saw the cutest little chipmunk!!

Are Woodchucks Marmots? Or just the same family?
Do we have Marmots here?


I saw them in Colorado. CUTE!!

[theworm[$]]

can I feed them from my hand?

[Penguinlady[$]]

Could it have been a possum? Opossum? Pogo Possum? They have spiky fur and sort of cute upturned noses, but long ratty tails. Pretty big, though... And endemic in populated areas.

[theworm[$]]

no - we had possums in Fl. No possum.

[drmomentum[$]]

I generally don't go near wild animals, so I don't know about feeding them.

Yep - they're in the marmot family.

Copying from Wikipedia:

Order:	Rodentia
Family:	Sciuridae
Genus:	Marmota
Species:	M. monax