Meet Some Small Mammals
Hoot, Holler, and Howl
Howler
monkeys are named and known for the loud, guttural howls that they routinely use at the beginning
and end of the day. They are the loudest animal in the
New World—their howl can travel for three miles through dense forest.
Meet
Reubin and Jolla
Prey and Predator
When settlers arrived in the American West and began
killing predators such as foxes, coyotes, and bobcats,
populations of prairie dogs, such as the black-tailed
prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus),
exploded. Because prairie dogs graze on crops and pastures,
farmers and ranchers set out to exterminate the "pests," reducing the prairie dog population by 90 percent in
the mid-1900s. This in turn added to the decline of
the endangered black-footed ferret (Mustela nigripes),
which preys on prairie dogs and usurps their burrows. Black-tailed prairie dog facts
Group Living
Some people think naked mole-rats (Heterocephalus glaber) look like pale hot dogs with teeth, but everyone agrees that they are fascinating. They are nearly hairless, have very powerful jaws, and are eusocial, which means they live in a colony (like ants) with worker and soldier mole-rats and a single breeding female, the queen. Naked mole-rat facts
