Spermophilus major
Creators: name: Wilson, Don E.
name: Thomas E. Lacher, Jr
name: Mittermeier, Russell A.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2016
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Chordata
Mammalia
Rodentia
Sciuridae
Spermophilus
Spermophilus major

description: 228. Russet Ground Squirrel <i>Spermophilus major</i> <b>French:</b> Spermophile roussatre / <b>German:</b> Rotgelber Ziesel / <b>Spanish:</b> Ardilla terrestre bermeja <b>Taxonomy.</b> Mus citillus majores [sic] Pallas, 1779, no type locality given. Restricted by S. I. Ognev in 1963 to “Steppe near Samara [Kuibyshev, Kuibyshevsk. Oblast, Russia]. Spermophilus major hybridizes with S. fulvus. Monotypic. <b>Distribution.</b> SW Russia and N Kazakhstan. Introduced into the N Caucasus Mts. <b>Descriptive notes.</b> Head-body 253-320 mm, tail 73-105 mm; weight 500-570 g. The Russet Ground Squirrel is large and has dark ocher-brown dorsum, mottled with cream often faint rust spots; eye ring is buff and typically faint. Head and face are often grayish, emphasizing yellow to rust spot below each eye. Sides are ocher to rust; venter is white to cream to light ocher. Ocher-brown tail often is rust on underside. <b>Habitat.</b> Diverse grasslands, steppes, meadows, and plains. The Russet Ground Squirrel can be found in more xeric open short-grass steppe into more mesic forest foreststeppe zone. It appears capable of persisting and perhaps expanding distribution in human-modified environments that promote short grass and open environments and in more arid habitats. <b>Food and Feeding.</b> The Russet Ground Squirrel is an herbivore, feeding mostly on grass and forb leaves, stems, shoots, tubers and especially seeds; it also eats cereal grains. It will occasionally eat insects or scavenge animal matter. <b>Breeding.</b> The Russet Ground Squirrel inhabits burrows but maternity burrows appear to be more convoluted with at least two entrances and vegetation-lined nest chamber in which young are born. Males appear to emerge before females in spring. Individuals mate soon after emergence. Litters average 7-8 young that emerge from burrows in late spring. <b>Activity patterns.</b> The Russet Ground Squirrel is diurnal and active aboveground in late spring, usually March-April, and immerges beginning in late June (older males) to September for adults and August-September for juveniles. <b>Movements, Home range and Social organization.</b> The Russet Ground Squirrel lives in loose colonies in which dominance rank is well defined and aggressive interactions are uncommon. It is territorial, and males defend a large area and females settle in larger territories. Young males disperse further than females. Females are philopatric and form kin clusters and matrilines that share space. High-pitched, short vocalizations are commonly produced in colonies. <b>Status and Conservation.</b> Classified as Least Concern on The IUCN Red List. Population trend of the Russet Ground Squirrel is unknown. Challenges to conservation are likely related to commercial hunting for food or pelts, but hunting pressure if believed to be low. It can be locally common and viewed as a pest that is hunted, trapped, and poisoned or burrows ploughed. It is able to persist in human-modified landscapes such as pastures, roadsides, earthen levees, and dams. <b>Bibliography.</b> Ermakov &amp; Titov (2000), Ognev (1963), Shmyrov et al. (2012), Thorington et al. (2012), Titov (2003a, 2004), Titov etal. (2008).
description: Published as part of <i>Don E. Wilson, Thomas E. Lacher, Jr &amp; Russell A. Mittermeier, 2016, Sciuridae, pp. 648-837 in Handbook of the Mammals of the World – Volume 6 Lagomorphs and Rodents I, Barcelona :Lynx Edicions</i> on pages 811-812, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.6840226