This animal is Richardson’s ground squirrel.
It is native to the short grass prairies of the northern Great Plains states and the southern parts of Alberta and Saskatchewan.
One name for these squirrels is “flickertail.”
One of North Dakota’s nicknames is “The Flickertail State.”
These animals do flick their tails a lot.
Another name for them is a “gopher.”
That nomeklature appears to be exclusively in its Canadian range.
My question about this name is pretty simple.
This is a gopher:
If I were going to mistake a Richardson’s ground squirrel with anything, I would have mistaken it for a prairie dog.
Not a gopher.
If someone can explain to me why someone would call this ground squirrel a gopher, I’d really appreciate it.
… because people aren’t particularly observant of wildlife, and so call any small burrowing rodent a “gopher”. Also the pocket gopher’s range doesn’t extend up into Canada, so they were calling a species they thought was similar by the same name. It’s the same logic that refers to moose and elk by confusing names because the North American moose (_Alces alces_) is the European elk, while the North American elk (_Cervus canadensis_) is closest to the European red deer. Why the names didn’t carry over and ended up muddled is an artifact of how many people “classify” animals, which is in very general terms. (I understand the moose/elk thing less than the misnaming of small rodents. The size and configuration of moose vs. elk vs. red deer is sufficiently impressive and distinctive that you would think people would be more precise.)
I thought there was one species of pocket gopher that did extend into Canada.
I believe it’s the Northern pocket gopher.
It lives in the same range as the Richardson’s ground squirrel, and it’s pale colored.
That’s the only clue I can find.
BTW, many great biologists and naturalists are Canadian.
… Yes, but it’s not the biologists and naturalist that are calling the Richardson’s ground squirrel a gopher. (I’m both Canadian and a biologist, FWIW.) While there are pocket gophers in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba they’re not commonly seen by the public, whereas the ground squirrels are highly visible. Usually people’s only contact with pocket gophers is seeing the burrows, which they (wrongly) attribute to moles. I understand why the mis-naming has happened, people tend to paint with a very broad brush when it comes to wildlife. It’s the same sort of generalization that has people calling things cryptids, or out of place wild animals, when in fact the creatures are household pets. We get a lot of bear reports where I am that are just someone’s Labrador retriever. They could legitimately be bears because of the location, but aren’t. I also once followed up on a cougar report (which could have been a cougar, yes), but which was a pair of foxes engaged in a procreative act. :D It’s not like this was difficult to see, either — it was in someone’s front drive, in broad daylight. Two small red dog-relative =/= one large cat, but the lady who made the call certainly thought they were.
http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/mammals/mammals/pocket.htm
That’s the state of North Dakota, and that’s pocket gopher species in question. I’m assuming that’s the same species that’s found in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta.
Ack. And my English fails! Excuse me please. That should have been relatives with an s, and a somewhat better constructed sentence too. Pardon me please, I’m not a native English speaker and the language still gives me difficulties sometimes.
Yes, that’s the Northern pocket gopher (_Thomomys talpoides_) that occurs in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. Sometimes it’s described as common, sometimes uncommon. It’s the northern extent of the species’ range occurrence can be very patchy, and many people don’t even know they’re part of the general fauna. There’s another species, the Plains pocket gopher (_Geomys bursarius_) that also ranges into Manitoba (by a very small amount).
I’ve always understood the difference btwn a gopher and a ground squirrel, unfortunatly no one would know what you were talking about if you called a ground squirrel a ground squirrel. People do call ground squirrels “prairie dogs” and “gophers” interchangably (most commonly called gophers though). However ground squirrel is almost never used. One of the reasons Prairie dog is a common moniker is because they’ve mostly been extirpated from the northern range, thus no one ever sees a true prairie dog outside of very southern Saskatchewan. Ranchers and farmers treat all of these animals the same, vermin is vermin; and a small prairie dog is almost identical to a large ground squirrel. I’m sure that after the dogs were gone settlers continued to use the name. As to how “gopher” became the common term I would assume that its because most people have never seen a real one. I see their holes all the time but gophers are nocturnal as far as I know. I’ve certainly never seen one.
Jeremy, I live in MT and travel in MT, N & S Dakota and Wyoming and I can assure you that prairie dogs have not been mostly extirpated from these states because I have seen thousands in each state and we cannot shoot them fast enough to put a dent in their very healthy populations!