Alpine marmots are cute furry creatures that have evolved to deal with the ice-age climate of the Pleistocene era, and today thrive at very high altitudes where it's quite cold. They hibernate for up to nine months per year, and are excellent diggers and can dig into soil that even a pickaxe would find hard to shift. They live in colonies in deep burrows, emerging to feed early in the morning and late in the afternoon, when it's cool.