Cody saw the first pup of the year today at Avalanche Cabin this morning. Later Matt and Cody caught our first pup!
What's really interesting is that the mother that was seen moving pups last week is probably not the mother of these pups. Matt told me today that Cherries (whom we captured last night) was not lactating. This suggests that Cherries is helping her mother, aunt, or sister raise the pups. Such alloparenting behavior happens, but it's rarely so obvious. The downside of discovering that Cherries is not a mom this year is that this means there will be only one litter at Avalanche Cabin. We're hoping on a good pup year to help recover the population. We'll see.
Blumstein Lab at UCLA (Team Marmot) reports on adventures and research findings from our long-term study of yellow-bellied marmots at the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory in Colorado, U.S.A.
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