Pallid ground squirrel

The pallid ground squirrel (Spermophilus pallidicauda) is a rodent of the squirrel family Sciuridae that lives in Mongolia and the adjacent Inner Mongolia region of China. It is quite common in the grasslands of the Gobi and nearby areas, is colonial and is active during the day. The animal is about twenty centimetres long, strawy brown in colour with a sandier tone in summer, and paler than similar ground squirrels. Its short tail is whitish yellow with a rust-coloured stripe along the upper side, and it has a white streak across the side of the face, white eyelids and a rusty spot under each eye. Whether it was only a subspecies of Spermophilus erythrogenys was long uncertain, until a 2007 revision of the genus and molecular sequence data showed it to be a separate species from that species and from its close relatives. It hybridises with Spermophilus alashanicus where their ranges meet.