The Mysterious World of...Prairie Dogs!

Visitors to the San Antonio Zoo are often amazed by the many mysteries of the animals they see. The okapi's confusing "zebra" stripes, the alligator turtle's weird fish-luring tongue, or the elephant's odd water-siphoning nose usually make our Zoo visitors tilt their heads with curiosity. Many people might be surprised at what makes zookeepers say "hmm." The latest mystery involves trying to figure out just what the prairie dogs are doing in their dark, underground burrows!

The new prairie dog exhibit at Kronkosky's Tiny Tot Nature Spot, opened last fall with the arrival of fourteen prairie dogs, four females and ten males. Many keepers had never worked with prairie dogs, so the new tail-wagging cuties were welcomed and closely watched in awe. Then, one day, our cute little rodents started losing their hair! Of course, our first concern was their health. Mammal Curator, John Gramieri, had worked with prairie dogs at other institutions and informed us that when prairie dogs begin to make their nests for impending offspring, they pull out their hair to line the nesting burrows! The prairie dogs were making their newly dug burrows into comfortable, warm and cozy nurseries. Okay, one mystery solved!

The first few months, the prairie dogs were busy making new burrows and seldom seen. Once we knew they were expecting, our next question was, "where are the babies?" We knew it would be a while before the prairie dog babies would venture out from the safety of their burrows; usually, a baby prairie dog won't come out for approximately two months. Because prairie dogs are so elusive, we were not able to catch them or inspect them like we would other animals that might be expecting. They would simply dive into their holes whenever we entered the exhibit; so in order to get them out, we would have to dig them up! Rather than start an excavation, we had to observe them daily and hope that the prairie dog young would venture out soon.

With great excitement, eventually a prairie dog baby appeared. Then, we saw another .and another .and another! Prairie dogs have 3-5 babies at a time, so with 4 females, we were expecting about 15 pups. The problem, prairie dog pups all look very similar and we had to wait until we could see all of them above ground at once before we could get the final count-16 pups!

The next mystery was which pup belonged to which mother? Since prairie dogs have such a complex social structure, this mystery may go unsolved. Prairie dogs live in colonies, called towns, which consist of a large group of individuals. However, within that town are several smaller social groups, called coteries. Each coterie contains intimate familial groups. Within the coterie, the female prairie dogs work together to raise the young, even nursing other females' pups! So, this mystery isn't easy to solve.

Be sure to stop by the prairie dog exhibit on your next visit to the zoo, and say hello to our 30 tiny, "mysterious" animals. You can be a prairie dog detective too, and have fun trying to solve the mysteries of the prairie dogs!