Life in a Rock Pile

The rocky mountains are known the world over as a great place to spot wildlife. Although most new visitors to the area are looking for the larger representatives like elk, bighorn and bear, some of the smaller residents can be equally exciting.

One of the more fascinating alpine animals is the pika. If you've never seen a pika --relax, you're not alone. I remember my first sighting. I was nearing the summit of Nigel Pass in Banff Park, when all of a sudden I started hearing some strange sounds. They could only be described as a sort of bleating 'Eeenk'.

I would have quickly discounted them as a ground squirrel or marmot had they not come from the middle of a large, seemingly lifeless rock slide. Somewhere within this maze of boulders was an invisible animal.

The problem was only compounded when I moved in for a closer look. That single 'Eeenk' suddenly became several --I was surrounded. I assured myself that I was not going crazy and decided, somewhat stub- bornly, to discover the maker of these strange noises.

As I watched and listened, I was amazed at how the sound of a single call seemed to come from all directions--almost like a ventriloquist throwing his voice. This must work very well to confuse predators; after all, it confused me. After about ten minutes, I resigned to the fact that I wasn't going to find my strange beast.

I struggled on with my pack, and was about to continue down the trail when a flash of movement caught my eye. About thirty metres away was a small gray animal. It resembled a wild guinea pig and blended in so well with the limestone that I almost lost it in the rocks. Out came the binoculars for a closer look. It was hunched on a rock and I could see that it was about seven inches long with short rounded ears and no visible tail.

When I finally returned home to my field guides, I flipped through the pages until, right after the rabbits, I found him. The book called him a Pika and placed him in the order Lagomorpha. This meant that they weren't rodents, as I had suspected, but were more closely related to rabbits (who are also members of this group).

Pikas have a fairly high body temperature (around 104 F) and a rise of between four and six degrees can be fatal. This narrow range forces them to live in cooler areas, usually at elevations above 7000 feet.

Unlike most other small members of the alpine community, the pika does not hibernate. It spends most of the summer months collecting plants and building large hay piles (some of which may be as large as a bushel) and leaving them to season, much like a farmer leaving out his bales. It will be these stores that will get it through the eight or nine months of winter.

Often, it must leave the security of its rock or talus slope in order to collect these plants. Recognizing its vulner- ability, it spends as little time in the meadow as possible. Quickly gathering plants, it places them crossways in its mouth and returns to the talus.