Ochotona princeps

The American pika is a small, herbivorous mammal of the family Ochotonidae, closely related to rabbits and hares. It is native to the mountainous regions of western North America, typically inhabiting rocky slopes and talus fields at or above the tree line. Unlike most mammals of similar size, the American pika is diurnal, being active primarily during the day. It employs two distinct foraging strategies: directly consuming vegetation or gathering and storing plant materials in "haypiles" to sustain itself through the winter months, a behavior known as haying.

Ochotona princeps

Charles J. Sharp · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
American pikaPBDB
Sits inside
OchotonaPBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Ochotonidae
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB, for Ochotonidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Mass
148.5 gWikidata

Time the record covers

At least 198 thousand years on record.

The record covers at least 210 ka to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 1.4 Mya to 0 Mya.

Pleistocene — about 10 of 11 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 1 of 11 occurrences1.5–1.4 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences1.4–1.3 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.3–1.3 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.3–1.2 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.2–1.1 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.1–1.1 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.1–1.0 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences1.0–950 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences950 ka–887 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences887 ka–823 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences823 ka–760 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences760 ka–697 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences697 ka–633 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences633 ka–570 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences570 ka–507 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences507 ka–443 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences443 ka–380 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences380 ka–317 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences317 ka–253 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences253 ka–190 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences190 ka–127 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences127 ka–63 ka Mya — about 3 occurrences63 ka–0 Mya — about 4 occurrences210 ka – 11.7 ka1.9 Mya0 Mya

11 occurrences of Ochotona princeps on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

11 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Ochotona princeps and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Ochotona princeps and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

348 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 11 sites for Ochotona princeps, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

9 references

Each of the 11 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Ochotona princeps

Credit
Charles J. Sharp
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Licence
CC Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itOchotona through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Richardson 1828)