Why do many people refer to Richardsons ground squirrels as gophers?
The word gopher derives from the French gaufre, referring to something that appears honeycombed by holes. Many animals that use tunnels in the ground are called gophers, including the gopher snake (Pituophis catenifer), gopher tortoise (Gopherus polyphemus), gopher frog (Rana capito), and pocket gophers (rodents in the genera Geomys and Thomomys). People from Europe and eastern North America were familiar with tree squirrels, but when they came to the prairies and saw mammals without bushy tails going in and out of burrows, the settlers did not realize they were looking at a true, but ground-dwelling, squirrel. Although the name spermophile (derived from the genus name Spermophilus) was in use, it never became part of the everyday language. Instead, frontiers-people adopted the name gopher, already commonly used for other species of ground squirrels living in various part of the USA. Consequently, many different species of ground squirrels throughout North America are called gophers, w
