A marmot, a rodent commonly found in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, unknowingly climbed inside the wheel well of a Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance vehicle
NEED TO KNOW
- A Colorado zoo’s field team was in for a surprise when they unpacked their truck and found that a marmot had hitched a ride over 100 miles to Denver
- The large rodent, commonly found in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, had climbed inside the wheel well of the Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance’s vehicle
- The animal was unharmed, and zoo staff released the animal on his home turf the next day
A Colorado zoo’s field team was in for a surprise when they unpacked their truck and found a hitchhiker had climbed aboard.
In a Facebook post shared by the Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance on Thursday, June 19, zoo staff detailed how their field team had been traveling the week prior and, upon returning to the zoo, discovered that a wild marmot had made its way inside the truck’s wheel well.
“Last week, our Field Conservation team got quite the surprise: a wild marmot hitched a ride in the wheel well of a field truck and made the nearly 3-hour journey back to Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance completely unharmed,” the post shared.
According to the zoo, the wild rodent had hitched a ride near Minturn, Colo. — a small town in the mountains outside of Aspen that is about 100 miles from Denver. The zoo field team discovered the marmot upon their return to the zoo, and the organization’s animal care, veterinary medicine, and field conservation teams quickly conducted a health check to ensure the wild animal had not been injured during his accidental three-hour trek…