Yellow Bellied Marmot is spotted again this year at the Empress Hotel!!

This morning Ron Bates, of the Marine Mammal Research Group and Five Star Charters, was wandering along the north side of the Empress Hotel in the Victoria Harbour (left side of hotel when you're facing the front enrance) when he spotted a Yellow Bellied Marmot (Marmota flaviventris)! This was the first time he'd spotted it since it was first seen last year in the same garden of the hotel. It was believed to have died or moved somewhere else but here it was sitting on a rock in the Empress hotel garden apparently unconcerned about the traffic passing nearby!

Yellow bellied Marmot sitting in the Empress Hotel garden!

So what's so special about this little guy? Well, these little animals are usually found at much higher elevations above 2000 m (~6000 feet) in open habitats such as steppes, alpine meadows, pastures and forest edge. Individual yellow-bellied marmots spend most of their lives in a burrow with several entrances. They mainly diurnal and terrestrial but will occasionally climb into shrubs and trees. It appears this marmot wasn't seen earlier because they hibernate from September-May each year. For more info on these little animals check out the University of Michigan's Animal Diversity Webpage on Marmots

Although it's not a marine mammal it's a very unusual sighting at the Empress Hotel...although it's not the first time unexpected wildlife has turned up at the hotel. In March, 1992 a cougar had to be removed from the hotel's underground parking (Times Colonist cougar report).

Yellow bellied Marmot sitting in the Empress Hotel garden unbeknownst to the many people passing close by!

Related

IUCN Red List for Yellow Bellied Marmot - Least Concern

General Marmot info especially on the Vancouver Island Marmot - very endangerd (~ 25 left in the wild)
http://www.marmots.org/