Reprinted from the June 22, 2001 Suburban News
We have cement steps leading into our house and now a family of chipmunks have built their home right under the steps. They often sit on the top of the steps to eat or just bask in the sun.
Chipmunks have so many predators they have to develop some special tricks to survive. They dart at great speeds over short distances. They always make more than one entrance to their home.
When they dig a hole, they never pile dirt by the entrance. They carefully carry the dirt away in the cheeks of their mouth and spread it so its unnoticeable on the ground.
Their design may seem strange but it is perfect camouflage for their life on the forest floor. They have a white underbody and throat plus white and black strips on their heads and sides. The rest of their body is a mixture of reddish brown and gray. This mixture of colors and stripes disguises the chipmunk by breaking up the shape their predators see. It makes them look like the twinkle of sunlight through the forest leaves dancing across the forest floor.
A chipmunk spends most of its time either eating or storing away food for next winter. It carries the food to the storage room in its burrow in those cheek pouches which bulge out to hold a considerable amount. I often throw some of the bird feeder’s sunflower seeds on the ground near the bird feeders just so I can watch them load up their cheeks and scamper away to put them into storage.
While the red and gray squirrels seem to be constantly quarreling about the seeds I might throw down, they both seem to ignore the busy chipmunks.
While they spend the better part of five months each year underground in their burrows, we always enjoy watching them when they are around. They let us get close often before they decide to scamper away.
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