Aw... yes. Looks like a groundhog. They're related to squirrels. Some climb to escape predators, some climb to eat bark when there isn't a lot of food available. Cute pic!

Great picture. Did you tell your dog babies what good dogs they were? We've got one that hangs around where our road leaves the highway but has never come down this way.
vickie

Great shots christie. Now a question about your pecan tree, has it had any nuts yet, what variety and how old is your tree?

BTW, our dogs killed a huge groundhog a few years back. It was the first one I had ever seen.

We planted two pecan trees 15 + years ago that were seedlings from the conservation department. A friend gave us their extras. They don't seem to be growing very fast. The one in the picture is the largest one. It's had nuts for the last four or five years but always just a few. I think the most I've gotten is two dozen. The squirrels get a few too. The other tree had one nut on it last year - it's first. I think now that it's getting big enough to bloom, they will pollinate each other and we'll get more. (I hope) I have a few smaller trees also that I planted from pecans.
With the late freeze and the ice storm damage, I'm not expecting any nuts this year. The tree in the picture had the top broken out of it after the ice storm and the groundhog is resting on one of the pruned limbs.

Thanks, I thought it took a long time for production.

Good info.....I will probably skip nut trees.

That's a first for me too. I didn't know they could climb but I'd much rather have them in the tree than on the ground or should I say under the ground. Great Pics!
Nancy

Neat shot Christie. In all of our 23 years in this location I have only seen one groundhog in our yard. It was apparently just passing through, thank goodness.
Last year I never saw one anywhere, but my DH and I have both seen one this spring on our way to town. I too didn't know they could clinb trees.

Glad I wasn't the only one who didn't know they could climb trees. I haven't seen him again. My dogs are keeping an eye out for him though. lol

Christie,

I grew up in Central NJ where groundhogs are a plague. Yes, they climb! The younger ones climb more than the older ones. One time, when I was a kid, I found six little ones climbing in a bunch of honey suckle. I picked them each up, by the tail, dropping them into a burlap sack and, of course,... took them home, asking if I could keep'em!

I've shot ground hogs climbing the fence into my garden (in NJ) and, if I ever see one on my place here in Tahlequah, OK, I'll shoot him too. They are so very destructive!

Incidentally, they are good to eat. They smell bad when being skinned and gutted. But they are heavenly when freshly roasted. For some reason I do not understand the leftovers warm up ... terrible! But first time around they are very good.

George

A groundhog ate off all the tops of my sweetpotatoes in a previous garden. I dispatched it. Even then, I felt sort of bad when I saw one that didn't make it across the highway, on my way to town yesterday. If they ever move in to our present yard, I will not be happy.
I have decided that it may be mama skunk who is mining our yard for grubs. Whatever it is, it sure did leave a lot of the yard pockmarked last night. :-(

macmex- any trans fat in cooked groundhog?

william

Marian, could it be armadillos mining your yard? We can always tell by the scent when skunks have been around.

I think I will pass on the groundhog cooking....even if I did find one.

Yes Gld, it sure could be armadillos. Someone else suggested that it might be skunks...so I was just agreeing. Lot's of times 'our' skunks leave no scent. I just checked, and it worked the front of the house last night...the base of the front steps, and on along the edges of the flowerbeds, on around the corner.
I'll pass on the groundhog cooking too. :-)
That reminds me of my dad. He was always talking about the wild critters that were good to eat. ( He passed away in 1960 at the age 0f 82.) My DH tells of the ones his Arkansas family ate, espacially during the depression years. I think raccoons, opossums and squirrels were the main ones.