Instead, they try maintaining a normal body temperature and feed on the food they have stored rather than entirely relying on fat reserves.

They take shelter in their burrows but don’t sleep through that time. Most chipmunk species hibernate when the temperatures go beyond the freezing point. During hibernation, the squirrels enter into torpor (inactivity) where their metabolism drops to 1% and their body temperature almost reach a freezing point. They hibernate underneath burrows for 5-8 months. The queen sleeps through the colder months and wakes up in spring to set up a new colony. They don’t eat, drink or defecate during hibernation.Īll bumblebees save the queen die in winter. Contrary to the belief, they don’t sleep continually through the period they hibernate but wake up in intervals and move around in their dens. Researchers thought their deep sleep to be torpor and not hibernation until studies conducted in 20. List of Hibernating Animals Animals that Hibernate in Winter Name of the animalīears are a classic example of true hibernators. While hibernation is winter sleep, aestivation is summer sleep. However, when they are inactive, which happens mostly at night, there is a drop in metabolic rate and body temperature.Īestivation is not a kind of hibernation but an equivalent to it. In the case of daily torpor, animals have normal metabolic rates and body temperature during the time of the day they are active. It could go on for weeks or even months or last for less than 24 hrs (daily torpor). Torpor: Torpor is the time of inactivity when the hibernator maintains a low metabolism and body temperature.They don’t sleep through that period, unlike true hibernators but wake to drink water between their periods of inactivity. Brumation: It is not truly hibernation but a state of inactivity or torpor seen in amphibians and reptiles.Their body, temperature, heart rate, breathing, and metabolism lowers. True hibernation: This is the most traditional type of hibernation, where animals become completely inactive in winter, going into a deep sleep.

3 animals that hibernate in winter