Little gopher

The head is broad and short, and the ears are relatively small. When folded forward, they do not reach the tip of the nose, only 20-30mm. The tail length is about 1.5 times the body length, 120-190mm long. The back of the body is dark gray with a more pronounced black tone. The hair tuft at the tail is not obvious. The end of the hair tuft is white and the rest is black. The hind feet are very long, three times as long as the front feet, reaching about 50mm. They are suitable for jumping. They have 5 toes, but the toes on both sides are very small and do not touch the ground when walking. The ventral surfaces of the middle 3 toes are exposed. There are no premolars.

It is distributed in Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia and Ningxia in China, and in Mongolia and Iran abroad.

The ground squirrel belongs to the Allactaginae subfamily. There are 3 species in the world, and only 1 in China. The number is relatively rare. It is a desert and semi-desert steppe species. The species status of this species is undisputed, and there are many subspecies. It is still unclear which subspecies the species distributed in China belongs to, and it is initially placed in <P. pumilio aralensis>.