thirteen-lined ground squirrel

Common

Grasslands, cultivated fields, meadows, roadsides, shrublands, suburban lawns, pine barrens, and beaches. Sandy or loamy soil.

Adults live for a few years. Only about 10% of young reach adulthood.

This is a slender, light brown or dark brown ground squirrel. It averages 9¾″ long including the tail.

The ears are short.

There are 13 alternating lines of dark brown and tan lines that extend from the nape of the neck to the tail. The 13 stripes may be either 7 broad dark brown and 6 thin tan stripes or 7 narrow yellow and 6 broader dark brown stripes. There are no stripes on the side of the face. The belly is whitish.

The tail is thin and sparsely bushy.

Franklin’s ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii) is much larger, the head and body 9″ to 10″. It does not have stripes on the back or rump. The belly is nearly as dark as the back.

Richardson’s ground squirrel (Spermophilus richardsonii) is much larger, the head and body 7¾″ to 9½″. It does not have stripes on the back or rump. It is found only in far western Minnesota.

Omnivorous. They eat seeds, fruits, grasses, forbs, and insects.

Taxonomy
This species was formerly included in the genus Spermophilus with about 40 other species. Recent molecular phylogenetic studies suggest that the genus should be split. In 2009 it genus was split into eight genera. Acceptance of the reordering is not universal. ITIS³⁷, NCBI³⁴, and NatureServe⁷² list the name as Ictidomys tridecemlineatus. GBIF²⁹ refers to this species by its old name, Spermophilus tridecemlineatus. Wilson & Reeder’s Mammal Species of the World places it in the subgenus Ictidomys within the genus Spermophilus, thus retaining its old binomial.