Groundhog records turn up across Tennessee, from the lowland farm country of the far west near Reelfoot Lake, through the Tennessee Valley and Ridge country of the east, into the rolling pasture and cedar glades of the Nashville Basin in the middle of the state. That spread fits an animal that doesn’t need one type of forest or mountain range. It just needs open grassy ground, pasture, or a field edge next to enough loose soil to dig a burrow.
A groundhog digs an extensive burrow system with multiple entrances, often at the edge of a hayfield, pasture, or roadside bank, and spends most of the day above ground grazing on grasses, clover, and other low plants. It’s one of the few Tennessee mammals that truly hibernates, sealing itself into a deep chamber each fall and not emerging again until late winter or early spring.
With 1,120 recorded occurrences, the groundhog is one of the most frequently recorded mammals in this Tennessee dataset, though every one of those records comes from GBIF rather than iNaturalist sightings. Reports run through the warmer months and drop off sharply in winter, tracking the animal’s hibernation rather than any change in where it lives.
