The following is my translation of an article called: Vom Murmeltier im Alpenpark von Hans Sammereyer. It appeared in a German popular science magazine, Kosmos Handweiser für Naturfreunde 1914, Heft 1, Seiten 41-44.
The original article is, as so often, adorned with fine photos, but this translation isn't. I hope I'm doing something like justice to the original author, although the relaxed and lyrical approach presents challenges. I suspect there are rich cultural references that I know nothing whatsoever about. It seems that the author was very fond of inserting short lines of dots into the text and, indeed, why... not? I'll try and... retain them. Presumably, they're... rhythmic. Actually, this prac... tice could be in... fectious.
I'm not aware of any previous translation.
Trevor Dykes.

On the marmot in the Alpine National Park by Hans Sammereyer
The entire Pinzgau is a green and white garden of blossoms! Everywhere, groups of trees form sunlit forests of black-green in the valley, and soft ribbons wave over the area, red fringed and bright white, and small houses cling to the slopes where it glistens with cherry blossom and other glowing colours. Indeed, even among the light coloured needles of the larch meadow Wild cherry or a blackthorn dare, here and there, to dress in spring colours and spring splendours.

The Zellersee lake is light and quiet. It nestles against its banks still and flat like a good child with its mother, and the great, high mountains look at themselves contentedly in this large mirror, as if they know that it is only rarely as peaceful in May...

And the great, high mountains become ever denser and higher the deeper one climbs into the Pinzgau, and they grow more rugged and steeper, and sometimes produce classic reefs reaching to the sky with knife-sharp blades, and grow finally into a Felsmassiv containing all variations from grey and cold to black, and to a transparent brightness showing the enormous distance that ends with the light blue velvet edging the mighty mountains.

The giant mountain with the firn, -that is the Großglockner...

It is still partly carrying deep snow. But, in some parts, poorly fertile ground is exposed, the naked, bleak rocks, the rubble heaps of grey stone, or even a small island where there is enough space for a tiny, sloping plain between the high walls.

It is deathly still up there. At the most, the wind sings a sad melody between the rocks, or a flock of Alpine jackdaws deep below in the ruins raise a spectacle of spring. Otherwise, there is only a soft sound coming from the valley below, and one is not sure whether this is the rustling of a forest or the sound of running water... Here, the stark colours of winter have a secure hold upon the rocks, and stretch further to greet the unbroken view across thousands, and still more thousands of cold, white summits, that dance among the blue until they are sucked into a grey mist surmounted by the great, blue dome of the sky...

A magnificent, unsympathetic, a beautiful, glorious, empty kingdom!... No life can live here, and even the eagle must glide over without reward, as ice stretches its fraternal hand out to rock, and a small flower must be esteemed as a piece of gold on cold rock here.

Just there, where the Sun has been gnawing at the snow for the whole day, is a plain released from ice and stealing into the rocks. And, just there, a shrill whistle suddenly sounds. It runs along the wall, echoes back from the projection of another wall, and comes to precisely where a large, steep spot has been freed from snow among the rocks, too strong for any manner in which the echo could have magnified it... A grey shadow is rushing across the snow and ducks behind a block of stone... small snowballs are rolling down from it... then something rushes between two rocks... and now a shrill whistle... and there... Has the snow broken into two?... on the middle of the lagest bank of snow stands a man-straight, thin and grey animal...

It's a bit smaller than the white Alpine hare and much thinner; it poses in a fine begging posture exactly as if intended. Then it relaxes and sinks down, sniffs to the front of its thick, little head, pulls its tail from out of the hole in the snow, and waddles amusingly over the snow.

The animal draws straight ahead towards the band of grass that manages to show that there is life up here, and life can prevail...

At that band of grass, the grey animal raises itself again to a fine begging position, and sinks down once more to bring its head in among the short, dry blades of grass...

The marmot is hungry, it is think and drowsy; all its winter provisions are deep down beneath the stone and soil... However, the warm May Sun is above, and the dry thin blades were raised up by rain and discretely grew and crowded together... The marmot has awoken after a long, winter sleep... But no! It's already been awake once before in March, when the soft rays of a warm Sun allowed rain to even reach the blocked up tunnel in the depths of the marmot's burrow.

Then, it had dug through the blocked entrance, had rummaged through the deep blanket of snow above, and had climbed out into the daylight.

It was nervous and weak, and even though the bright March Sun had offered some life energy, it was just enough to search the half-thawed patch of grass, which was as poor and dry as all the food...

It then climbed back down to its seven fellows deep beneath the Earth, and curled itslef up... hid the squirrel-like head with the stumpy ears between its rear legs, and fell into a dull, deep sleep...

So they have lain, all eight marmots, for six whole months already since the great snowfall of All Saint's Day cut them off from the outside. And so lie all marmots of the Alps, as the harsh winter robs them of every small plant. What business would they have, these tough lovers of juicy Alpine plants, in such a harsh wintry world? They have their refuge in their castle dug into the earth... And with busy paws, the old, large winter cave was enlarged, another tunnel for a new pair was arduously dug out, and a large, mighty larder was built for the hay brought in and then spread orderly, the tunnels were stuffed with thick, secure blankets of hay so that no icy draft should disturb the sleepers, and then each sought its place and slept, slept, slept... long and deep... with few, few breaths, only enough to keep life within with the half-dead body...

And now it's May. Secret rain has got into the granns bands, and the Sun is warm above the firn and ridge.

The small society of marmots up there on the walls above the empty area is already awake, and here and there arises the silhouette of a rodent on the grey stone or one wanders across the snow...

And the old Ratz (a male marmot), who is the highest on the rocks and who always sleep alone grouchily in a deep tunnel, and enviously defends the small, lush clearings up on the steep walls against every intruder, is now lying again on the flattened projecting rock that has already been smoothed down by much lying and sun, and suns itself luxuriously. He no longer whistles for he is all alone, and he does not want to give himself away and, as a settler from elsewhere, he has nobody to warn. When, however, the figure of an eagle can be seen at a distance hanging in the sky, then he walzes slowly back to his burrow, shoves his brown-grey body with its back smoothed down from digging into the tunnel, and looks out mistrustingly for a long time; only when the young have stopped giving their warning whistles and the males have already reappeared on the rock around, then he will return thoughtfully to his corner of the cliff that protects a small spot in which his favourite food of fresh roots grow...

Recently, over there on the stony grass, there was a load, outraged squeaking, and the male eagle, who has his eerie somewhere distant in the wall, flew over the rocks like a brown shadow, and its large claws carried off a brown-grey sack with a plump, squirrel-like head and, since then, the old immigrant has been very shy and careful. The young, hungry animals below, however, even whistle with worry should a fleeing jackdaw appear...

Day by day, the marmots are growing thinner as the May Sun gets hotter... They find too little food, and the thick coat, which grew in autumn to carry them through the winter, has now fully gone. The Alpine aster and the plantain and the Alpine clover, and all the good plants, have only just begun to expand their roots, and it's hard work to get at them. It's almost too little to live...

The marmots do not become vigorously active until late June... Only the old glacier remains the same, cold and solid...

When the Alpine flowers develop their perfumed heads, which will suddenly be mown away, and the one responsible for this is certainly a nibbling marmot. When the morning breaks over the distant wood, blue-grey and pale red, then overly courageous young even dare to go far, far up to where thereis no burrow, but there is a kingdom of juicy plants; they rush from rock to rock, hide themselves here and there, eat and wander until the morning Sun has not yet properly greeted the world, and then go back downhill. The old mountain guides, who check the glacier for dangerous fissures by hammering it with the pick, are known by them, and their arrival gives rise to its own whistle which fills no animal with fear.

However, when the cheeky mountain fox craftily pretended to be dead during the first loud whistle, then the whistling sounded over all the cliffs, and the arch trickster moved off to think of a better manoeuvre...

And correct: the next time it came, it let itself be loudly whistled at, inspected burrow after burrow with its cultivated, expert manner, and when it found a juvenile in an emergency tunnel, that animal remained in the dead end and dug itself frantically more deeply in... For two days long, there was no quiet life in the colony, and the cliffs again rang with worried whistling.

In the warm summer the marmots have their feast. During the night, grazing shoots through the stones in thousands. The summer is very short there, and the plants grown more quickly, the plant food is much stronger than down in the valley.

Now the marmots are braver than ever. What with a suspicious glance from the tunnels, a hopping over stones and heaps, a man-straight watching and long, pointed whisker hairs, and a playing of catch among the young animals, a waggle with the tail, a relaxed lounge in the Sun by the older, settled animals on their nice flat rocks...

And what events should a climbing person appear somewhere in the distance! Then the most agitated whistling sounds from all heaps and cliff corners... all huurry to their burrows, every animal the stranger sees whistles and takes up a begging position...

And there are now very small, cuddly, yellow-brown things among them that are still very foolish and require loyal, maternal care... they arrived in the world in the depths of the burrow hideaway in June, and were like mice, so amusing and blue-grey. And the Katz (a female marmot) had much to do with the four small things in the warm hay storeroom, then there was not as much to eat as there now is.

And now the winter burrow has been left. All now reside comfortably in the airier, small summer burrows, comfortable and close to the grazing...

But when September comes to the land and the mountain deer below begin to bellow, then there is haste and hurry to go to the winter burrow, and one generally sees marmots with bushels of grass in the mouth wandering to their tunnels, and carefully laying in their winter provisions...

We will soon be able to write a tragedy of the marmot.

Stupid superstition, shooting fever, poaching all help one another to clear entire long stretches of mountains of these charming animals. The wild meat is good, although somewhat sweat, the stupid superstition extols it and lends it a whole pharmacy of healing powers, and it disappears like the wonderful Siberian roe buck because the Chinese used their horns as medicine, as this was seen as essential for the folk medicine of the mountains. And poaching, which brings money from catching marmots but not from shooting them, digs them out here in the autumn from burrows in their dozens, and what was not dug out will freeze in their ruined burrows. And so this characteristic animal of the Alps disappeared here and there...

But things are now improving. Sensible hunting reserves brought it protection. It is increasing on the lower, uneconomic mountain chains of Tyrol and Seitzerland, and the Alpinnaturschutzpark* ('Alpine Nature Protection Park') has marmots on Großglockner, and this has enabled a careful preservation. Thanks to this protection, marmots are again spreading across the mountains of Salzburg and Oberkärntern, and it has even reached as far as the area of Golling in Steirermark.

Caring human hands have reintroduced it to the Rax and Schneeberg, and then to Eisernerz in the Steiermark, and this is today to be thanked for large, lovely colonies. If the nature conservation movement succeeds in setting foot in all the Alps, then fine times will arrive for the marmot, and in the ice and snow of Kaar and Jochrab, Flülerche and Schneehuhn, where the characteristic whistle of this animal belongs...

Naturally, it will never be like in the time of the Neolithic Pfahl farmers, when the marmot could be found all along the valleys and lower mountains...

* Promotional material and leaflets can be obtained for free from the Verein Naturschutzpark e.V., Stuttgart, Pfizerstraße 5.
(Translator's note: That final piece of information is naturally also most of a century out of date, so writing to that address wouldn't necessarily be very helpful for information on marmots. A quick check suggests you might find a Vietnamese Catholic vicar, an architect, possibilities of finding accommodation... Actually, you could also come across the Franckh-Kosmos Verlags-GmbH & Co KG, the publishers of this Kosmos Handweiser. They'll probably sell you something informative about marmots.)

An index of more of my translations of old Kosmos articles can be found at:

Kosmos Translations Archive

A number of Mesozoic (and post-Mesozoic) location summaries can be found at Localities.