A critter native to the B.C. Interior is capturing the hearts of visitors to White Rock beach.
The yellow-bellied marmot has been spotted near the East Beach boat launch several times in the past week, prompting an influx of emails and photographs to Peace Arch News.
“It is a quite rare species in this area,” notes Noah Snell, a nature photographer who captured dozens of images of the marmot.
Chris Rickwood spotted the visitor Friday.
“Marmots are normally mountain animals,” Rickwood writes in an email.
“Maybe this one hitched a ride on a freight train as it travelled through the Rockies and got off when the train slowed down through White Rock.”
While some suggested the mammal may be one of the at-risk Vancouver Island marmots, officials with the Marmot Recovery Foundation assured that is not the case.
Foundation executive director Viki Jackson speculated the visitor – one of four marmot species found in Canada – inadvertently caught a ride to the coast in someone’s boat trailer.
Regardless of how the marmot got there, White Rock resident Gloria Sales said she is concerned for its survival. Sales believes it is the same marmot she spotted last fall, noting the “dear little guy” has lost weight.
“I can’t believe he survived the whole winter,” she told PAN Monday. “You can tell he’s got some fattening up to do.”
Sales said she contacted Critter Care Wildlife Society about the marmot last fall, and plans to do so again, in an effort to ensure it doesn’t fall victim to resident eagles or other harm.
But the society’s Melissa Allen said as long as the marmot appears healthy, the best thing people can do is simply let it be.
“There’s no real way to catch a fully functioning, healthy wild animal,” Allen said.
Sales said despite concern for its welfare, the critter’s appearance is a welcome one.
“We get so much doom and gloom, it’s kind of nice to see something cute for a change.”