Talk:Groundhog

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Contents 1 Intrusive ferret 2 Woodchuck vs. groundhog 3 More photos 4 Dog Picture 5 Freeways and interchanges 6 Squeaver 7 Tongue twister 8 Article Adjusted 9 Male/Female size ratio? 10 Whistle pig 11 Whistle pig 12 Image caption

[edit] Intrusive ferret

Why is there a picture of a blackfooted ferret on this page? (Or have I just gone 'round the bend?) Stargoat 14:24, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

which picture did you have in mind? Neither of them looks very mustelid to me, though I am not particularly familiar with groundhogs. seglea 18:53, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The one on the sidepanel [:Image:Groundhog.jpg] looks like what I've always known to be a groundhog or woodchuck in the New York/New Jersey/Pennsylvania area. The one on the bottom, [:Image:AnGroundhog.jpg] looks unfamilar. I believe that image to be misclassified. --ChrisRuvolo 16:14, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I removed [[image:anGroundhog.jpg|left|A groundhog peeking out from a hole]] and added a question that that images talk page. Jake 17:57, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Woodchuck vs. groundhog

Why does the article consistently use Woodchuck when the title is Groundhog? If Woodchuck is the more popular name for the animal, then why isn't that the name used for the title? pomegranate 21:32, Feb 2, 2005 (UTC)

This is one of those common names that is fiercely regional. They tend to be groundhogs in the northeastern US and woodchucks elsewhere. Groundhog is probably the better article title because a slightly higher population base is likely to use the name and it's the name used for the holiday. Otherwise, I'd think it's like British vs. American spellings in wikipedia where the first use wins. --Aranae 06:34, Apr 30, 2005 (UTC)

They are almost universally called woodchucks here in New England.Marc29th 23:06, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

They're generally called groundhogs in Eastern Canada (though woodchuck is also used); marmots on the west coast. Sunray 00:32, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Marmots are a number of different critters, only one species of which is the woodchuck... As for the name of the article, I think it should be at Woodchuck, but not strongly enough to throw a fit about it. Most people know the name "groundhog" only because of the holiday. Tomer^talk 03:46, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More photos

This site says:

There is a great place to watch woodchucks if you happen to live in, or are visiting, the metropolitan Washington, D.C. area. Take the Red Line Metro north toward Shady Grove and get off at the White Flint Metro Station. The banks on either side of the tracks are covered with Woodchuck burrows. The woodchucks seem to like standing by their burrow entrances watching the commuters getting on and off the trains.

Would some Wikipedians of the area try to get some photo shots? David.Monniaux 11:30, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

The two current pictures are good (lying down and sitting/standing up on hind end) but it would be good to have an additional picture of walking/running. 69.87.200.242 18:59, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dog Picture

Considering the dog is tied up in the picture. Shouldn't it says the dog is receiving the unexpected visit from the groundhog and not the other way around?

We should actually get rid of the picture altogether--it's just ... "bad". The caption is another matter entirely; the idea that either one of the animals is "visiting" the other is cute writing suitable for the community page for a small newspaper, but ridiculously unencyclopedic. Tomer^talk 03:46, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

The picture is gone now, which is probably good. My dog "visited" a woodchuck in the local cemetery today...which ended up with one more corpse in the graveyard.

[edit] Freeways and interchanges

What is this nonsense about freeways and interchanges? It sounds like it was written by someone [young] who happened to see a woodchuck alongside the road once. Until someone can demonstrate that there's some relevance to freeways in the distribution of woodchucks, I'm taking it out of the article. Tomer^talk 03:46, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm from Ottawa, and I've seen *a lot* of groundhogs along some of the big roads. My guess is that this partly because is there's a lot of grass, and not many other animals bug them. But I don't know what you'd be able to cite.

[edit] Squeaver

On the basis of this google search, I'm removing the "or squeaver" business from the article. It appears to be an idioletic neologism, and without looking, I'm guessing was added by the person with the golden retriever... Tomer^talk 04:00, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tongue twister

The way I always had people relate the second part of that quoted tongue twister was: 'A woodchuck would chuck all the wood he could chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood.'

Is this just differing regional variations or what?

[edit] Article Adjusted

I've moved around some of the text and created another section in the article. For now, behavior and anatomy are in the new section. Hopefully the article will be expanded a bit, allowing for more organization. BioTube 21:05, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Male/Female size ratio?

Does anyone know if females are generally larger or smaller than males? I'm trying to better identify some local groundhogs which seem to differ a lot in size. -- Stbalbach 03:59, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

There's no size difference unless you get a pregnant female. Whitaker and Hamilton (1998) report a study where 64 males were 475-673 mm (mean = 599) long with a weight of 2.2-5.3 kg (mean = 3.5) and 74 females were 440-700 mm (mean = 595) with a weight of 2.0-5.9 kg (mean = 3.5). --Aranae 04:08, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Ok thanks, Aranae! -- Stbalbach 04:13, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Whistle pig

I added that groundhogs are also known as whistle pigs in British Columbia. It's true, though, why do you think whistler is called whistler, from whistlepigs.

I removed any mention of geographic usage of the term from the lead section because it just encourages anyone who has heard the term in their part of the world to add an "also in.." which is really just original research - word usage across geography is very complex and it's probably been used all over the place. It's too much detail for the opening section. -- Stbalbach 14:15, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Whistle pig

should we add that whistle pigs whistle, though it seems obvious from the name...but yeah they do whistle...hence [[whistler, British Columbia}}

[edit] Image caption

It is clear that User:Stbalbach and I are in a revert war over the caption for Image:Groundhog-Standing2.jpg. The intial caption read "Groundhog standing erect." Stbalbach changed the caption to read "Groundhogs graze on a salad of vegetarian variety." I find the new caption objectionable because the groundhog in the image is not feeding, it is in an alert posture, the use of the term "salad" is just strange in this context, the term "vegetarian variety" is also very awkward, and the statement overall is quite informal. If standing erect is not desired, perhaps "Groundhog in alert posture" or "Groundhog surveying its surroundings". Instead of violating the three revert rule, I invite other editors to comment. --Aranae 04:09, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

There is no reason to use valuable caption space to state the obvious "A groundhog standing" - this is not simple.wikipedia. If that is all that can be said about it, have no caption at all, it is banal and lowers the quality of the article. As for the term "salad" it is an idiom which simply means what everyone knows it to mean: a variety of green leafy plants. This is a valuable addition to the article since no where else in the article does it talk about what groundhogs eat. In fact the caption could be expanded or better defined to be more specific - do they eat meat? (I know some marmots will eat meat). Anyway image captions should ideally be linked to the content of the article in some meaningful way. -- Stbalbach 14:18, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

From mammal fact sheets: Woodchuck. [1] "Woodchucks seem constantly on the alert when outside their burrows and give a shrill warning whistle when alarmed." I wonder if this information would serve as a basis for an informative caption? --Walter Siegmund (talk) 04:04, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

That would also serve to address the statement made in the prior section of this talk page and sounds good to me. I would prefer that to the caption I just added about diet since the animal in the picture is on alert and not foraging. --Aranae 04:18, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Mindful of Stbalbach's comment above, I moved the foraging caption to the young groundhog image; it doesn't show youth distinguishing features (or if it does, they are not called out), the individual is amongst vegetation, and the original caption wasn't very informative. I may have tried to include too much in the erect posture caption. Please trim or reword as you see fit. Walter Siegmund (talk) 04:50, 14 December 2006 (UTC)