Description

Distinguishing Features - Overall colouration, varying, from pale buff to black with buff-tipped guard hairs, giving a "salt and pepper" appearance; dark brown to black on tail and feet. Heavy-bodied; short-legged.

Size -
45.7 - 65 cm (18 - 25.6 in)

Habitat

Widespread throughout Northwestern Ontario; prefers pastures and fields; forest edges.

Diet

Grazer; vegetative parts of plants, leaves, bark, saplings; fruits and vegetables.

Notes

The groundhog is a nervous animal and never forages far from its burrow where it is vulnerable to attack by many kinds of predators. It is a true hibernator that accumulates a thick layer of fat during the summer to see it though winter inside its deep, sealed burrow, built below the frost line.

A female will produce a litter of 1 to 9 offspring each year.

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