As I noted a couple of posts back, my trailer is parked about 1/2 mile away from one of the prairie dog towns (or colonies) here at Bryce Canyon. The 3 Utah Prairie Dog photos included with this entry are all from that area and maybe next week I will get around to visiting the really big one here at the park (estimated to be about 150 of them). In addition to the 3 towns of which I am aware that are inside the park, I stumbled upon a couple of others in the Dixie National Forest adjacent to Bryce. By the time I wrap things up here I should have more shots of Utah Prairie Dogs than I will know what to do with.

These first 2 images are the same animal; in the first it had been doing some digging at the opening of the burrow when it stuck its head up to have a look around. Must have been satisfied that all was well and went back to digging. A few minutes later it stood up at the edge of the burrow and, for the most part, just stood there looking off to the west. I shot this image while it was responding to the barks of another one that had been vocalizing on the other side of the road. (The posture kind of looks like it either had an upset stomach or had been kicked in the groin).

This was a "dog" on a mission. When it first caught my eye it was standing with a few blades of grass and I decided it must be eating. But the longer I watched, the more grass it kept stuffing into its mouth until it couldn't stuff any more in and then ran off to duck into a burrow. I showed the image to some of the ranger's and it was decided that it was probably a female gathering material for the nursery. They also noted the critter's "pear" shape - an indication that it is probably expecting . . .