Chipmunk

Chipmunks are small, striped squirrels that dig burrows and belong to the subtribe Tamiina. Most species live in North America, but the Siberian chipmunk is mainly found in Asia. The term "chipmunk" came into use during the 1800s, and these animals have also been called chitmunk, chipmuck, chipping squirrel, and ground squirrel—though "ground squirrel" can also refer to other types of squirrels. Chipmunks eat both plants and animals, with a diet that mostly includes seeds, nuts, fruits, and buds, but also extends to other plant matter, fungi, insects, small frogs, worms, bird eggs, and nestlings. They often use their cheek pouches to carry food back to their burrows, either to eat right away or to store for winter. This habit of storing seeds helps spread and establish new seedlings and fungi in forests. Scientists classify chipmunks into four genera: *Tamias* (with only the eastern chipmunk still alive), *Eutamias* (only the Siberian chipmunk still alive), *Nototamias* (three extinct species), and *Neotamias* (23 species, mostly in western North America). Because chipmunks look similar, these groups were once treated as subgenera, and for most of the 1900s they were placed in a single genus. John James Audubon and his sons called them the "chipping squirrel [or] hackee" in their mid-1800s work *Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America*. Chipmunks mostly search for food on the ground but climb trees for nuts like hazelnuts and acorns. In early autumn, many species start stockpiling nonperishable food for winter, usually storing it in a single larder inside their burrows and staying there until spring, unlike some other animals that make many small caches. Around humans, they eat cultivated grains, vegetables, and other plants from farms and gardens, which sometimes makes them considered pests. Eastern chipmunks, the largest species, mate