Ord’s kangaroo rats never need to drink water, pulling all the moisture they need from the seeds they eat, which lets them thrive in Oregon’s driest high-desert ground east of the Cascades. They move by hopping on their hind legs like a miniature kangaroo, and their long, tufted tail helps them balance during quick, erratic jumps that make it hard for a predator to predict where they’ll land next.
Records run from May through September with no single sharp peak, a spread that fits a nocturnal, burrow-dwelling rodent active through the warmer months and largely dormant in winter. NatureServe ranks the species S4, apparently secure, in Oregon, and nearly all its records come from GBIF specimen data rather than photographs, a fair reflection of how rarely this animal is seen above ground by day.
Full species profile
