Featured Animal: Chipmunk

Chipmunks are small squirrel-like rodents that are native to North America, although one species is found in some European countries.

Chipmunks eat a wide variety of wildlife like frogs, mushrooms, birds, eggs, plants nuts and seeds. In the autumn, the chipmunks begin to gather their winter food stash, which they store in their burrows to last them until spring.

The most common chipmunks are the red coloured chipmunks with light brown stripes on their back. These are North American chipmunks. Chipmunks are also becoming more popular as pets.
There are 25 different species of chipmunk living in the North American forests. The chipmunk is often referred to as a small squirrel due to the obvious similarities between the two mammals.

The chipmunk plays a vital within the forest eco-system which the chipmunk inhabits through the dispersing of seeds when the chipmunk eats the fruits and berries that the forest plants produce and the chipmunk chews on the wood of plant stalks and tree trunks which disperses the spores from the plant into the surrounding forest.

Chipmunks construct extensive underground burrows which can be more than 3.5 m in length and these chipmunk burrows often have several well-concealed entrances to keep the chipmunk burrow a secret from unwanted predators. Within the chipmunk burrow the chipmunk sleeping quarters are kept extremely clean as the chipmunks keep nut shells and feces stored in separate refuse tunnels.