Prairie Dog
a heavily built animal of the squirrel family. It is about sixteen inches in length and much resembles its smaller relative, the prairie squirrel. It is more agile and is neater in appearance than the woodchuck, to which also it is related closely, and which it seems to replace in the western plains. It may be found from Montana to Louisiana. It lives in large colonies, in what are known as prairie-dog towns. Each family has a burrow extending down to a considerable depth. The prairie dog feeds on vegetable matter, grasses, and roots. Like the woodchuck and ground squirrel, it seems to stay reasonably near its burrow. When the colony scatters to feed, sentinels are posted to give the alarm. In case of danger the little creatures scamper home. They have a habit, squirrel like, of sitting up to look about. If one approaches a dog town without creating too great an alarm, the citizens may be seen sitting up at the entrances to their burrows. On nearer approach, they dive in head first with a short bark, but a few minutes later noses and eyes may be seen peering out to note what is going on, and, if there seems to be no particular cause for fear, the prairie dogs come up and sit as before.
A small burrowing owl and a rattlesnake have the reputation of sharing the burrows of these inoffensive animals. Without a doubt both animals are unwelcome. The community seems to get on with harmony only because the dogs have no way of driving the intruders away. It has been supposed that the owl, in particular, fed on young prairie dogs; but an examination of many stomachs shows that the diet of the owl consists of grasshoppers and other insects of the plains. So far as the case of the rattler is concerned, it is known that if a snake be caught far enough below ground, the owner of the burrow summons his companion with a shrill squeak, and that the entire colony goes to work excitedly scratching in soil and gravel to bury the rattlesnake alive if possible.
The Year Book of the Department of Agriculture for 1901 gives an account of a colony of prairie dogs in northern Texas. This region, 250 miles long by 100 miles in width, is estimated to contain an average of twenty-five burrows to the acre. Mr. Merriam estimates that the number of dogs in this colony can not be less than 400,000,000. Continuing his calculations, and allowing that thirty-two prairie dogs consume as much grass as a sheep, and 256 dogs as much as a cow, he estimates that the grass annually eaten by the pests in this colony would support 1,562,500 head of cattle. The prairie dog occupies lands too dry for general cultivation, and shows little disposition to wander eastward into the Mississippi Valley, but, where irrigation has led to the cultivation of fields, he forsakes his buffalo grass and, like the wood-chuck of New England, feasts on clover and other crops to their rapid destruction.
In 1890 two pairs of prairie dogs were turned loose on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts. They increased so rapidly and became such a pest that in 1900 the town expended over $500 in their extermination. The ranchers and land owners of the West poison off the prairie dogs by scattering wheat or corn soaked in a solution of strychnine.
A typical burrow described in the report mentioned above descended fourteen and a half feet on a slight slant, then turned abruptly at right angles and ran thirteen and a half feet in a horizontal or slightly ascending direction. Several side chambers were connected with the horizontal portion. A pouch two or three feet below the surface is evidently intended as a temporary resting place or chamber in which to turn around in case the dog desires to come up again.