Who’s Out There? Chipper Chipmunks

I LOVE chipmunks. I first met their furry little faces and puffed cheeks full of food while hiking with my parents in Rocky Mountain National Park. I was two.

And ever since they’ve had a presence in my life.

When I’m out hiking or backpacking and I think there may be chipmunks around I’ll leave a couple nuts on the ground. (Though I’ve recently discovered they don’t like nuts). I was doing it as a way of saying thanks to them for providing so much joy.

I love the way they stand on their hind two legs with a seed between the long nails of their front feet, and just nibble away like they’re eating an ear of corn.

It never ceases to amaze me how much they can stuff in their cheeks. They look like they have massive tumors on either side of their nose! According to researchers they can hold three times as much food in their cheek pouches as the size of their cheeks.

Can you imagine if we had little pouches in our cheeks where we could gather all the berries we find when hiking in the woods! We wouldn’t need to carry little baskets, right?

There are 25 different species of chipmunks. All but one of them are in North American.

It can be easy to mix up a chipmunk with a golden mantle ground squirrel. They look so familiar. But the stripes on the backs of chipmunks continue onto their heads. Whereas with the Golden mantle ground squirrel it stops at their neck.

Chipmunks hibernate, but they don’t store fat to see them through long winters like bears do. Instead they wake up occasionally and eat from the stores of food they’ve gathered during the warmer months. This is what humans do, right? We can and gather food for the winter to put in our pantry’s, even if we can go to the store. But we’re preparing for winter, or a time when we can’t get to a store.

During hibernation, chipmunks can seem like they are dead. Their heart rates can drop from 350 beats per minute to around 4 beats per minute, and their body temperature can drop from 94 degrees Fahrenheit (34.4 Celsius) to as cold as 40 F (4.44 C), according to the National Wildlife Federation (NWF). Who needs to take an ice bath, when you can internally drop your temperature to 40 degrees! What a great skill that would be when we’re lying on a hot beach and want to cool off!

Chipmunks are omnivores. They eat berries, nuts, seeds, and mushrooms.(but apparently not almonds.)

Like other mammals, chipmunks give birth to live young. The pups only stay with their Mom for about two months. (Hmm, you think humans could get around on their own that young?)

I think most of us find chipmunks to be fun loveable critters. Look at the popularity of Alvin and his brothers!!

Like all wildlife, it’s good not to feed them. What happens is that wildlife give birth based on the amount of food that’s available. So if there’s plentiful food then they’re likely to have lots of young. And then when there isn’t any human food, the young could die of starvation because they’ve become dependent on human food.

If you feed birds, it’s impossible to keep them away. Just limit the amount of bird seed you put out each day to what the birds can eat in a day. This keeps away skunks, raccoons, bears and other wildlife.

Next time you see one of these golden beauties, stop and notice how far up the body do the stripes go? You’ll be able to wow all your friends knowing the difference between a chipmunk and a golden mantle ground squirrel!