Marmot bobak how they can be saved. steppe marmot

09.05.2021 -

Baibak is an inhabitant of the virgin steppes of Eurasia, in Russia it can be found in the Rostov, Voronezh, Saratov and Ulyanovsk regions, as well as in Chuvashia, Tatarstan and Bashkiria. Baibak is one of the largest squirrels: its body length is 50-70 cm, the weight of males reaches 6.1 kg. The bobak spends the winter in deep hibernation, does not make reserves for the winter, but before hibernation it feeds intensively, doubling its weight in two to three months. Burrows are well closed with earth plugs.

It feeds on juicy and soft plant foods. Their favorite plants are wild oats, wheatgrass, chicory, clover. During the day, the bobak eats up to 1-1.5 kg of plant matter. Water usually does not drink, being content with the moisture contained in plants, or morning dew. It also consumes animal feed - locusts, caterpillars, usually eating them along with grass.

Baybak, fleeing from pursuit, runs rather quickly, reaching speeds of 12-15 km/h on flat areas, and tries to hide in the nearest hole. This animal needs protection.

Systematics

Russian name - steppe marmot, bobak

Latin name - Marmota bobak

English name - Bobak marmot

Class - Mammals (Mammalia)

Order - Rodents (Rodentia)

Family - Squirrel (Sciuridae)

Genus - Marmots (Marmota)

The word "marmot" is formed using the suffix "ok" from the word "sur" borrowed from the Turkic language. The word is onomatopoeic, reminiscent of the sound made by an animal in danger. The original Russian name is "whistle".

There are 3 subspecies within its range.

conservation status

According to the international status, the marmot belongs to the species, the existence of which causes the least concern - UICN (LC). However, in most of its range, the bobak needs protection. For example, in the Omsk region, it is included in the regional Red Book.

In connection with the plowing of the steppes, reforestation and intensive fishing, the number of boba was sharply reduced in the 20th century. The most difficult was the situation in 40-50 years. of the twentieth century, but protective measures ensured the safety of the species in local foci in Ukraine, in the Ulyanovsk and Saratov regions, in Tatarstan. Subsequently, work was carried out on the reacclimatization and introduction of the boba bakak to the most favorable places for it. In recent decades, the range of the bobak has begun to expand, and the numbers to grow. By the beginning of the 2000s. the number of the European subspecies reached almost 210,000 individuals, the Kazakh subspecies - almost 113 thousand.

View and person

Anthropogenic factors, both direct and indirect, have a great influence on the number and range of the bobak. The indirect (and most important!) are the plowing of the steppes, which deprives the animals of their habitual habitat. But hunting for marmots is also underway. They are hunted for the sake of warm and light fur. The meat of these marmots is quite edible, it is especially valued in some regions of Mongolia, and the fat is used in engineering and folk medicine. Baibak does not cause much harm to agriculture, since, as a rule, it does not eat cultivated plants.

In colloquial speech, the word "baybak" is used quite often. So they call a clumsy, baggy person, a lazy person and a sleepyhead. The long hibernation of all marmots, including the marmots, was the reason for the saying "sleeps like a marmot."

Distribution and habitats

Baibak inhabits the open spaces of Eastern Europe and Northern Kazakhstan. Now the habitat of the bobak has a mosaic character, it has been preserved only where the unplowed steppe has been preserved. Baibak is an inhabitant of flat grass-forb and turf-grass and dry grass-wormwood steppes. Habitat on the lands occupied by vegetable and grain crops is not typical for the bobak; animals settle in such biotopes reluctantly and temporarily. They either quickly leave these crops or die.

Appearance

Baibak is one of the rather large marmots: body length up to 59 cm, tail length up to 15 cm; the mass of males that have eaten before hibernation is up to 5.7 kg.

The wool of the bobak is short and soft. The color of the back is sandy-yellow with black or dark brown ripples. The belly is slightly darker and redder than the sides, and the top of the head is darker than the back. The cheeks are light, dark streaks under the eyes. The end of the tail is black.

Lifestyle and social behavior

Baibaks live in families that form large perennial colonies. Each family occupies a certain territory, which it protects from the intrusion of strangers. The size of a family plot can range from 0.5 to 6 hectares. Adult animals regularly bypass their possessions, leaving odorous marks on the border. The scent glands are found on the muzzle, the soles of the front paws, and at the base of the tail. Border conflicts rarely happen among baibaks, usually neighbors live peacefully.

Burrows of marmots, depending on the purpose, differ in complexity. Protective (temporary) burrows are small, short, with one entrance, without a nesting chamber; in them marmots hide from danger and occasionally spend the night. There are up to 10 such holes in a marmot within the boundaries of its feeding area.

Permanent holes are more difficult, and they are winter and summer. Summer (brood) burrows are a complex system of passages and have from 6 to 15 exits to the surface. From the main passage of the burrow, several branches depart, in which the bobaks make latrines. At a depth of 2-3 m, there is a nesting chamber, into which the animals drag dry grass and other plant rags. Wintering burrows are simpler, but the main living chamber in them is located deeper (at a depth of 5-7 m) in the non-freezing horizon. Residential burrows are used by several generations of marmots for a long time, sometimes several hundred years.

The total length of passages and burrows in a permanent burrow sometimes reaches 60 m or more. When constructing a permanent burrow, up to a dozen cubic meters of soil is ejected to the surface, resulting in the formation of a marmot hill. The height of such a hill can reach 1 m with a diameter of 3-10 m. On the marmot near the living hole there is a compacted "observation" platform, from where the marmots examine the surroundings. In places densely populated by marmots, up to 10% of the surface is covered with marmots. The composition of the soil, the nature of vegetation, and even the world of invertebrates on marmots differ markedly from the rest of the area, so marmots play an important role in steppe biocenoses.

By the end of summer, marmots accumulate up to 800-1200 g of fat, which is 20-25% of their weight. They leave their burrows less and less, settling in them for the winter. In late August-September (no later than the 20th), marmots gather in wintering burrows in groups of 2-5 to 20-25 individuals. They go into hibernation with the whole family: together with their parents, both the young of this year and last year's litter lie in the same hole. They close all entrances to the hole with stoppers from a mixture of feces, earth and stones. The air temperature in the hole, even in severe frosts, does not fall below 0°C. During hibernation, all vital processes in marmots freeze, body temperature drops from 36-38o to 4.6-7.6o, breathing slows down to 2-3 breaths per minute instead of the normal 20-24, and heartbeat to 3-15 beats per minute. minute instead of 88-140. In winter, marmots do not eat and hardly move, existing at the expense of accumulated fat reserves. However, since the energy expenditure during hibernation is small, in the spring the animals wake up quite well-fed, with fat reserves of 100-200 g.

Baibaki come out of hibernation in late February-early March, so hibernation lasts at least 6 months. After a little fattening, marmots begin to repair and dig new protective burrows, and then proceed to repair residential burrows.

Baibaks are active during the day, they become active with the sunrise. On the surface, the animals of the same colony maintain visual (posture "column") and sound communication (whistling indicating danger). Usually several animals serve as sentries while others feed. Hearing in marmots is less developed than sight, so the main signal is not a whistle, but the sight of a running relative. Seeing this, all the inhabitants of the colony also rush to the holes. In the middle of the day, marmots rest in their burrows, and in the evening they come out again to feed. On the surface of the earth they spend 12-16 hours a day.

The groundhog moves in short dashes, periodically stopping and freezing in place. Fleeing from persecution, it runs quite quickly, reaching a speed of 12-15 km/h on flat areas and trying to hide in the nearest hole. The character of the bobak is quite peaceful, and fights between them rarely happen.

Groundhogs have few enemies, mostly stray dogs and foxes. Young marmots are preyed upon by eagles, as well as badgers, corsacs, and even polecats.

Feeding and feeding behavior

Baibaki feed on juicy young shoots, leaves and flowers of herbs and cereals. While feeding, they bite plants over large areas, but due to the fact that they show a certain selectivity, they do not disturb the vegetation cover of the steppe, as herds of ungulates often do.

The diet of marmots is seasonal. In spring, they eat mainly overwintered rhizomes and bulbs of plants, in summer - young shoots, leaves, flowers. At the end of summer, when the steppe vegetation burns out, marmots have to move far from home in search of wet areas. Seeds in the stomachs of boibaks are not digested and are dispersed along with the droppings. That is why marmots prefer not to settle among cereal crops. Groundhogs do not drink water, being content with the liquid contained in plants. They don't stock up for the winter.

Reproduction and parenting behavior.

In April-March, the mating season begins for baibaks. Pregnancy lasts 30-35 days, in a litter of 3-6 cubs. Newborn marmots are naked and blind, 9-11 cm long and weighing 30-40 g (this is about 1% of the mother's weight). Their eyes open very late, only on the 23rd day. For the period of pregnancy and feeding of the young, the male moves to another hole. The female feeds with milk for up to 50 days, although at the age of 40 days in late May and early June, marmots already begin to eat young greens. Surchatas stay with their parents until next summer, after which they build their own burrows. But they often spend the second wintering in the same hole with their parents.

Marmots become sexually mature in the 3rd year of life.

Lifespan

In captivity, bobaks lived safely up to 8 years.

The history of life in the zoo

In our zoo since 2011, there have been 3 bobaks (2 females and 1 male). As in nature, they are active in summer - they eat and dig holes, and sleep in winter. In the first years, zoo employees made wintering burrows for them, and then the marmots began to dig on their own. In the fall of 2016, each animal dug a separate hole for itself, since they are not a family.

In recent years, when in Russia (as in the USA) they are trying to celebrate Groundhog Day, all the media and many visitors really want our groundhogs to predict the coming of spring. But we have a different climate (and the type of marmots is different), and our marmots on February 2 are still fast asleep. In early spring, as in 2017, they woke up in early March.

The groundhogs live in an enclosure with natural soil, but the employees had to make a cement base under it, as they began to dig so actively that they almost left to "walk around the zoo."

Visitors to the zoo may notice that there is a special fence along the bottom edge of the enclosure. It had to be built in order to save the fingers of visitors. Groundhogs seem cute and clumsy (beeps, after all!), But they bite great.

The diet of bobaks in the zoo consists exclusively of plant foods (vegetables, grass) in the amount of about 500 g per day.

Photos by Anastasia Kadetova

Groundhog Features and Habitat

Marmot (from the Latin Marmota) is a rather large mammal from the squirrel family, a detachment of rodents.

motherland animal marmots is North America, from there they spread to Europe and Asia, and now there are about 15 of their main species:

Gray he is the mountain Asian or Altai marmot (from the Latin baibacina) - the habitat of the mountain ranges of Altai, Sayan and Tien Shan, East Kazakhstan and southern Siberia (Tomsk, Kemerovo and Novosibirsk regions);

Baibak, also known as Babak or steppe marmot (from the Latin bobak) - inhabits the steppe regions of the Eurasian continent;

Forest-steppe aka marmot Kashchenko (kastschenkoi) - lives in the Novosibirsk, Tomsk regions on the right bank of the Ob;

Alaskan, he is Bauer's marmot (broweri) - lives in the largest US state - in northern Alaska;

In the photo marmot bobak

Gray-haired (from the Latin caligata) - prefers to live in the mountain systems of North America in the northern states of the USA and Canada;

Black-capped (from the Latin camtschatica) - according to the regions of residence, they are divided into subspecies:

Severobaikalsky;

Leno-Kolyma;

Kamchatsky;

Long-tailed, he is red or Jeffrey's marmot (from the Latin caudata Geoffroy) - prefers to settle in the southern part of Central Asia, but is also found in Afghanistan and northern India;

Pictured are alpine marmots

Yellow-bellied (from the Latin flaviventris) - the habitat is the west of Canada and the United States of America;

Himalayan he is Tibetan marmot (from the Latin himalayana) - as the name implies, this type of marmot lives in the mountain systems of the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau at heights up to the snow line;

Alpine (from the Latin marmota) - the place of residence of this species of rodent is the Alps;

Marmot Menzbir aka Talas marmot (from the Latin menzbieri) - common in the western part of the Tan Shan mountains;

Forest (monax) - inhabits the central and northeastern lands of the United States;

Mongolian, he is Tarbagan or Siberian marmot (from the Latin sibirica) - common in the territories of Mongolia, northern China, in our country lives in Transbaikalia and Tuva;

Olympic he is the Olympic marmot (from the Latin olympus) - habitat - the Olympic Mountains, which are located in the north-west of North America in the state of Washington USA;

Vancouver (from the Latin vancouverensis) - the habitat is small and located on the west coast of Canada, on Vancouver Island.

Can be given description of groundhog animal like a mammalian rodent on four short legs, with a small, slightly elongated head and a voluminous body ending in a tail. In the mouth they have large, powerful and rather long teeth.

As mentioned above, the marmot is a rather large rodent. The smallest species is Menzbier's marmot, which has a carcass length of 40-50 cm and a weight of about 2.5-3 kg.

The largest is animal steppe marmot forest-steppe - its body size can reach 70-75 cm, with a carcass weight of up to 12 kg.

The color of the fur of this animal varies depending on the species, but the predominant colors are gray-yellow and gray-brown.

Externally, in body shape and color, they are marmot-like animals, only unlike the latter, they are slightly smaller.

Groundhog character and lifestyle

Groundhogs are rodents that hibernate during the autumn-spring period, which can last up to seven months in some species.

During wakefulness, these mammals are diurnal and are constantly in search of food, which they need in large quantities for hibernation.

Marmots live in burrows that they dig for themselves. In them, they hibernate and stay all winter, part of autumn and spring.

Most marmot species live in small colonies. All species live in families in which there is one male and several females (usually from two to four). Groundhogs communicate with each other with short calls.

Recently, with the desire of people to have unusual animals at home, like cats and dogs, groundhog became a pet many nature lovers.

At their core, these rodents are very intelligent and do not require huge efforts to keep them. In nutrition, they are not picky, they do not have smelly excrement.

And for their maintenance there is only one special condition - they must be put into hibernation artificially.

Groundhog nutrition

The main diet of marmots is plant foods (roots, plants, flowers, seeds, berries, and so on).

Some species, such as the yellow-bellied marmot, eat insects such as locusts, caterpillars, and even bird eggs. An adult groundhog consumes about one kilogram of food per day.

During the season from spring to autumn, the groundhog needs to eat enough food to gain a fat layer that will support his body during the entire winter hibernation.

Some species, such as the Olympic groundhog, gain more than half of their total body weight, about 52-53%, which is 3.2-3.5 kilograms, for hibernation.

Can see photo of animal marmots with fat accumulated for the winter, this rodent in the fall looks like a fat dog of the breed.

Groundhog reproduction and lifespan

Sexual maturity of most species occurs in the second year of life. The rut occurs in early spring, after hibernation, usually in April-May.

The female bears offspring for a month, after which offspring are born in the amount of two to six individuals.

Over the next month or two, little marmots feed on mother's milk, and then they begin to gradually get out of the hole and eat vegetation.

On the photo cubs groundhog

When they reach puberty, the cubs leave their parents and start their own family, usually staying in a common colony.

In the wild, marmots can live up to twenty years. At home, their life expectancy is much less and very much depends on artificial hibernation; without it, an animal in an apartment is unlikely to live for more than five years.

Appearance

Baibak is one of the largest squirrels: its body length is 50-70 cm, the mass of fattening males reaches 10 kg. The body of the bobak is thick, on short, strong paws, armed with large claws. The head is large, flattened, the neck is short.

Baibaka is easily distinguished from other marmots by a short tail (no more than 15 cm) and a uniform sandy-yellow color. Due to the dark tips of the guard hairs, its back is covered with dark brown or black ripples, thickening at the back of the head and on the top of the head. Cheeks are light reddish; brown or black streaks under the eyes. The belly is noticeably darker and redder than the sides; the end of the tail is dark brown. There are albino marmots. Moulting at bobak once a year; begins in May and ends (for old marmots) by the end of August, sometimes dragging on until September.

Spreading

In the past, the bobak was widespread in the steppe and partly forest-steppe zone from Hungary to the Irtysh (it was absent in the Crimea and Ciscaucasia, but now the bobak is observed in the steppe part of the Crimea, half of Tarkhankut), but under the influence of plowing virgin lands, it disappeared almost everywhere, preserved only in areas of untouched virgin lands on the Don, in the Middle Volga region, the southern Urals and in Kazakhstan. Now the bobak lives in the Rostov, Volgograd regions, Belgorod, Voronezh (Stone steppe between the Bityug and Khoper rivers), in the northeast of Saratov, in the south of the Ulyanovsk and Nizhny Novgorod regions, as well as in Chuvashia, Tatarstan and Bashkortostan. In Ukraine, it occurs in several isolated foci in Lugansk, Sumy (Romny district), Kharkov and Zaporozhye regions. Beyond the Urals and in northern Kazakhstan, its range is less fragmented; here the bobak is found from the river. Ural to the Irtysh: in the Orenburg and Chelyabinsk regions of Russia, in the northern part of the West Kazakhstan, western parts of Aktobe, Kustanai, North Kazakhstan, in the north of Karaganda and in the East Kazakhstan region of Kazakhstan.

Lifestyle and nutrition

Baibak is a natural inhabitant of plain grass-forb steppes. In the case of plowing the steppe, the marmots soon leave for the nearest virgin lands or, in extreme cases, for “inconveniences”: deposits, unplowed slopes of ravines, beams, river valleys, borders, pastures, and even on the sides of country roads. Sites suitable for the bobak habitation now make up an insignificant share of arable land. Habitat on crops of grain and vegetables is uncharacteristic for him; in such places the bobak settles involuntarily and temporarily. For longer periods it lingers on crops of perennial grasses. Moderate grazing and close human proximity do not affect it.

Baibaks live in large perennial colonies, arranging burrows for various purposes and complexity for housing. Protective (temporary) holes - small, short, with one entrance, without a nesting chamber; in them marmots hide from danger, occasionally spend the night. There are up to 10 such holes in a marmot within the feeding area. Permanent burrows are more difficult, they are winter and summer. Summer (brood) burrows are a complex system of passages; they are connected to the surface by several (up to 6-15) outlets. From the main passage of the burrow, a series of ditches or dead ends depart, in which marmots arrange latrines. At a depth of 2-3 m, there is a nesting chamber, up to 0.5-0.8 m³ in volume, into which the groundhog drags dry grass and roots. Winter (wintering) burrows can be arranged in a simpler way, but the nesting chambers in them are located deeper, in non-freezing soil horizons - up to 5-7 m from the surface. There are also summer and winter burrows. The total length of passages and burrows of a permanent burrow reaches 57-63 m. In especially complex burrows, there are several chambers of different sizes, and the passages form several floors. When constructing a permanent hole, up to a dozen cubic meters of soil is thrown to the surface, forming a marmot hill. Usually marmot stands out sharply against the background of the steppe chernozem in a lighter color; the soil here is drier, saturated with nitrogen and minerals from marmot droppings. The height of the hill reaches 40-100 cm with a diameter of 3-10 m. On the marmot near the inhabited hole there is a trampled platform, from where marmots inspect the surroundings. The rest of the marmot is gradually covered with vegetation that is very different from the surrounding flora: wormwood, couch grass, and kermek grow here. In places densely populated by marmots, up to 10% of the surface is covered with marmots, which is why the landscape acquires a peculiar wavy character.

Nutrition

Baibaki feed on plant foods. Their favorite plants are wild oats ( Avena sativa), wheatgrass ( Agropyrum cristatum), chicory ( Cichorium intybus), clover ( Trifolium repens) and field bindweed ( Convolvulus arvensis); vegetable and agricultural crops are rarely damaged. Forage specialization is seasonal, consisting in the preference for different parts of the plant. So, in early spring, marmots eat mostly overwintered rhizomes and bulbs; in summer - young sprouts of cereals and herbs, as well as flowers. In the second half of summer, when the steppe vegetation burns out, bobaks move farther and farther from their holes in search of wet areas with lush grass. Ripe fruits and seeds in their stomachs are not digested, dispersing along with the droppings. During the day of baiting, the bobak eats up to 1-1.5 kg of plant matter. Water usually does not drink, being content with the moisture contained in plants, or morning dew. It also consumes animal feed - locusts, molluscs, caterpillars, ant pupae, usually eating them along with grass. However, in captivity, marmots willingly eat meat, including the meat of relatives, although in nature they do not feed on vertebrates. Baibak does not make stocks for the winter.

Lifestyle

Adult bobak

Baibaki come out of hibernation in late February - early March. After a little fattening, they begin to repair or dig new protective holes; later - to correct and expand residential burrows. Activity begins at sunrise, when the animals wake up and go to feed. On the surface, marmots maintain visual (postures in a column) and sound (roll call, danger signal) communication. Usually two marmots in a colony act as sentries while the others feed. The groundhog's hearing is less developed than sight, so the main danger signal is not so much a whistle as the sight of a relative running towards the hole. Seeing this, other groundhogs also rush to the holes, even if there was no cry. At noon, bobaks usually rest in burrows, and in the evening they again go out to feed. On the surface of the earth they spend 12-16 hours.

The groundhog moves in jerky dashes, sometimes stopping and freezing in place. Fleeing from persecution, it runs quite quickly, reaching speeds of 12 - 15 km/h on flat areas, and tries to hide in the nearest hole.

In March-April, the mating season begins for baibaks. Pregnancy lasts 30-35 days; usually in a litter of 3-6 cubs. Newborn marmots are naked and blind, 9-11 cm long and weighing 30-40 g (this is about 1% of the mother's weight). Their eyes open only on the 23rd day. During pregnancy and lactation, the male moves to another hole. The female feeds with milk for up to 50 days, although at the age of 40 days, in late May - early June, the marmots already begin to feed on grass. Previously, it was believed that marmot families consisted of parents and two broods of weather cubs. But observations of tagged animals have shown that some of the underyearlings leave their families and settle in other families as foster children, and their parents, in turn, accept other people's cubs. Surchatas stay with their parents until next summer, after which they build their own burrows. But they also spend the second wintering together with their parents. In general, the nature of marmots is peaceful; they rarely fight and drive away only alien animals.

By the end of summer, the groundhog accumulates up to 800-1200 g of fat, which is up to 20-25% of its weight. Animals are less and less likely to leave their burrows; they renew their nests by dragging dry grass into them. At the end of August - September (no later than the 20th) marmots gather in wintering burrows in groups from 2-5 to 20-24 individuals. They clog all the entrances to the hole with dense plugs from a mixture of feces, earth and stones and fall into deep hibernation, which lasts 6-8 months. The air temperature in the hole, even in severe frosts, does not fall below 0 °C. During hibernation, the life processes of marmots almost freeze: body temperature drops from 36-38 to 4.6-7.6 ° C, breathing slows down to 2-3 breaths per minute instead of the normal 20-24, and heartbeat - up to 3-15 beats per minute instead of 88-140. In winter, marmots do not eat and hardly move, subsisting on stored fat reserves. However, since the energy expenditure during hibernation is low, marmots often wake up quite well-fed in spring, with a reserve of 100-200 g of fat.

The steppe marmot (baibak) is a large winter-sleeping rodent (body length up to 58 cm, tail up to 14.5 cm), adapted to a burrow lifestyle, a representative of the terrestrial form of the squirrel family. The coat is relatively short and soft, sandy-yellow, with worm or dark brown ripples; the lower surface is only slightly darker and rufous than the sides, or their coloration is indistinguishable.

The darkening of the coloration on the upper surface of the head is less developed than in other species, mainly in its anterior section, while in light-colored individuals, especially in spring fur, it is preserved only in the anterior part of the forehead and above the nose. The cheeks are light in their posterior region, and in the anterior part and under the eye are mottled with brown or black; the area of attachment of the vibrissae is the same color as the body or is rufous. The ear is light, usually without red tones. The border of the lips is white; on the chin there is often a wedge-shaped, white spot turned back, the tail is darker, and often redder than the top, with a dark end and sometimes with a black, longitudinal stripe above.

The skull of the steppe marmot is comparatively broad-cheeked, the zygomatic arches diverge backwards more strongly than in other species; the postorbital tubercle, swelling in the anterior-upper corner of the orbit, and supraorbital foramina are well developed. The upper edges of the orbits are comparatively strongly raised, and the ends of the supraorbital processes are noticeably lowered. The lacrimal bone is relatively long, its greatest height above the lacrimal opening is less (often 2 or more times) than the smallest distance between the lacrimal and pre-wing openings; both openings, especially the second, are comparatively small. The posterior edge of the lacrimal bone in at least 80% of individuals is connected by a suture along the entire length with the anterior edge of the orbital wings of the maxillary bones. These latter are large, forming a rectangular or wide-triangular outgrowth in the anterior part, for the most part noticeably rising above the upper edge of the lacrimal bone. The anterior upper premolar (P3) is on average relatively larger than in other species, and the lower one (P4) has one posterior root, usually with a well-marked fusion along its entire length.

A plain species that lived in all the steppes from Ukraine to the Irtysh, but the plowing of virgin lands and intensive fishing have significantly undermined the stocks of the bobak. Now it has been preserved only in protected areas of the virgin steppe on the Don, in the Middle Volga region and the southern Urals.

Fossil remains, most of which belong to the bobak or a close ancestral species, have been known from the territory of the European part of the USSR since the Early Quaternary. Outside the boundaries of distribution in historical time, finds are known from Polissya, the Moscow region (the most northern location), the foothills of the Crimea and from the western part of the Caucasian isthmus. A significant part of the finds of fossil marmots of the Pleistocene time from the northern parts of continental Western Europe also belongs to the bobak.

Spreading. Back in the first half of the 18th century. was widespread in the steppe zone and in the forest-steppe to its northern borders, living in forb and feather-grass steppes up to about 51 ° N. sh. in Ukraine, 55° N sh. in the Trans-Volga region, to the southern parts of the Chelyabinsk and Tyumen regions, the southeast of the Omsk and the Irtysh left bank. The southern border remains less clear, in particular, it is still unclear whether the bobak lived in historical time south of Manych and between the Volga and the Ergeni. In connection with the plowing of the steppes and increased fishing within the boundaries of the former range, only individual colonies and groups of colonies survived, in the European part of the USSR, mainly in the protected areas of the virgin steppes.

Since 1936, in the steppes of the European part of the USSR, attempts were made to reacclimatize the boba bakak (Derkulskaya and Khomutovskaya steppes, etc.), but most of the releases outside the protected areas ended in failure.

The steppe marmot inhabits the forb and grass-forb steppes of the plains, rising to the foothills no higher than 400-500 m above sea level. m. In the same natural conditions, it reached the largest number in historical time, penetrating north to the border of the forest-steppe, and south to the dry, “colorless” steppe. Avoids damp sites and places with the high level of standing of ground waters. In the south, distribution is limited by the short vegetation cycle of the main fodder plants and, accordingly, the impossibility of baiting during the active period of the life cycle. In the European part of the USSR, outside the protected areas, marmots are currently pushed aside by plowing on the slopes of ravines, gullies and other lands that are inconvenient for economic development.

Active in the morning hours; in spring, the daily break in activity is weakly expressed; at the end of summer, the animals often come out to feed only once a day. They hibernate for at least 6 months. Before the occurrence, they do not feed for some time, they renew the litter of the nesting chamber, and the inlets are clogged from the inside with earthen plugs. Together with their parents, both newly arrived animals and marmots of last year's litter usually lie in the same hole. Like many other winter-hibernating rodents, the first to hibernate are old, single-living males and nulliparous females, and the bulk of sophomores. The periods of occurrence (September-early October) are more extended than awakenings (end of March-April).

Burrows reach 4-5 m depth; the colonial nature of their distribution depends largely on the nature of the landscape and is less pronounced in monotonous natural conditions. Permanent burrows, especially wintering ones, reach great complexity and serve, year after year, for many generations of marmots. The number of holes in such burrows can be up to 12-15 (usually 5-6). Summer burrows serve as a habitat for adult males and females and immature animals of the offspring of the last year. Temporary burrows, the number of which can reach up to 10 per permanent one, are used during seasonal movements of members of this family group within the feeding area. Emissions of earth at the inlets form marmots ("butanes"), used by animals as "observation points". The vegetation on them is well different from the surrounding even long after the animals have abandoned their burrows and the traces of the entrance holes have disappeared. Despite the fact that the annual growth of marmot is no more than 0.2-0.3 m 3, since part of the land is used for slaughtering offnorks, some marmots in old colonies can occupy an area of 30 m 2 or more. The influence of marmots on the soil-forming process in the virgin steppe has recently been very significant.

Steppe marmot, or bobak(Marmota bobak). Author Andrew Karpov

The steppe marmot feeds on juicy young shoots, leaves and flowers of herbs and cereals. Marmots bite plants while grazing over a large area, but due to selective eating they do not disturb the vegetation cover; as is sometimes seen in ungulates. The need for feed is up to 1 kg of green mass per day. The marmot is very sensitive to the moisture content of the feed; thus, after steppe fires, mass hibernation was observed long before the onset of its natural terms. Animals found among the plowed areas may exist for some time at the expense of the surrounding cultivated vegetation, but after a few years they migrate from the fields or die.

The rut occurs in the spring after awakening, still in the hole; young are born once a year, usually 4-5, less often 6-7 per litter. The bulk of the profits become sexually mature in the third year of life. In some places, adult females breed after a year or even two, which is associated with the oppressed state of the populations.

In commercial numbers, until recently, the steppe marmot was preserved only in Kazakhstan. Now, due to the plowing of virgin lands and a catastrophic decline in numbers, in many areas it requires protection and restoration work. Even in the recent past, in the south of the European part of the USSR, it was an important natural carrier of the plague pathogen. In flat Kazakhstan, it is unknown as a keeper of the plague virus.

Geographic variation and subspecies. Geographical variability is poorly understood. Apparently, the size and relative size of the tail decrease towards the east, and the coloration becomes lighter.

The steppe marmot (baybak) needs protection.