# Pika — Facts, Threats & Conservation

*Ochotona spp.*

> Pikas (genus Ochotona) are small, round-eared alpine mammals related to rabbits that live on cold, rocky mountain slopes across Asia and western North America, where they are threatened by rising temperatures that their heat-sensitive bodies cannot tolerate.

**IUCN status:** Varies by species (Least Concern to Endangered — IUCN)  ·  **WARN range:** Central Asia, East Asia, South Asia, Western North America, Rocky Mountains, Himalayas, Tian Shan, Tibetan Plateau

## Quick facts
| Fact | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Body length | 14–25 cm (5.5–10 in) |
| Weight | ~80–300 g (2.8–10.6 oz) |
| Lifespan | 3–6 years in the wild |
| Litter size | 1–6 young; typically 3–4 |
| Gestation | 18–30 days (species dependent) |
| Elevation range | Up to 6,130 m (20,100 ft) above sea level |
| Diet | Herbivore: grasses, forbs, sedges, mosses |
| Activity | Diurnal; active year-round (no hibernation) |

## Scientific classification
- **Kingdom:** Animalia
- **Phylum:** Chordata
- **Class:** Mammalia
- **Order:** Lagomorpha
- **Family:** Ochotonidae
- **Genus:** Ochotona
- **Species count:** ~37 recognised species (taxonomy ongoing)

## Conservation status
- **Status:** Varies by species (Least Concern to Endangered)
- **Population:** Varies; Ili pika estimated fewer than 1,000 individuals (2018)
- **Trend:** Decreasing for most species under climate pressure
- **Assessed:** 2018 (Ili pika); 2016 (American pika, Least Concern)
- **CITES:** Not listed on any CITES Appendix
- At least 4 of ~37 species are Endangered (Ili pika, Kozlov's pika, Hoffmann's pika, silver pika). The American pika has disappeared from over one-third of documented sites in Oregon and Nevada.

## Key facts: Pika
- Pikas are lagomorphs — relatives of rabbits — not rodents, despite their mouse-like appearance.
- Most species cannot survive prolonged temperatures above roughly 25 °C (77 °F), and for the American pika exposure above 28 °C (82 °F) can be lethal within hours — making pikas acutely vulnerable to climate warming.
- Rather than hibernating, pikas spend summer building 'haypiles' — caches of dried vegetation that sustain them through winter under the snowpack.
- The Ili pika (Ochotona iliensis) of China's Tian Shan mountains has declined by more than 70 % since the 1980s and is listed as Endangered by the IUCN (assessed 2018), with fewer than 1,000 individuals believed to survive.
- Pikas act as ecosystem engineers: their burrows aerate soil and their haypiling behaviour distributes plant material across talus slopes.
- The American pika has already disappeared from more than a third of previously documented sites in Oregon and Nevada, signalling rapid range contraction even in a species currently listed as Least Concern.

## What is a pika, and how does it differ from a rabbit or rodent?
Pikas belong to the order Lagomorpha — the same group as rabbits and hares — not to the rodents (Rodentia), despite superficially resembling large mice. The key distinction lies in dentition: lagomorphs possess a second, smaller pair of upper incisors directly behind the main pair, a feature absent in rodents. Within Lagomorpha, pikas form their own family, Ochotonidae, first formally described by Oldfield Thomas in 1897. All living pikas belong to the single genus Ochotona, which currently contains roughly 37 recognised species, though taxonomic revisions continue to add species — particularly from the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau — and some authorities place the total closer to 29 to 34 depending on how subspecies are treated. Physically, pikas are compact and rounded, measuring 14–25 cm in body length, with large, round ears, dense fur, very short limbs, and no obvious external tail. Their weight spans approximately 80 g (Gansu pika) to about 300 g (Glover's pika). Unlike their rabbit cousins, pikas do not possess the elongated hind legs built for speed; instead, their robust forelimbs and non-slip foot pads are adapted for scrambling across loose rock. Their dense, soft fur provides insulation in environments where temperatures can plummet well below freezing — an adaptation that also makes them dangerously sensitive to heat. The genus is sometimes divided into four subgenera based on ecology and social behaviour: burrowing steppe pikas and rock-dwelling mountain pikas.

## Where do pikas live, and what habitat do they need?
The majority of pika species are found across the mountain ranges of Central and East Asia: the Himalayas, Karakoram, Pamir, Tian Shan, Altai, and the vast Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, which harbours the greatest species diversity. Two species — the American pika (Ochotona princeps) and the collared pika (Ochotona collaris) — inhabit the Rocky Mountains, Sierra Nevada, Cascade Range, and Alaska Range of North America. Most species are strict specialists of cold, rocky terrain. Rock-dwelling species occupy talus slopes — accumulations of frost-shattered boulders — and cliff faces, where deep crevices provide refuges from predators and insulating microclimates. The talus acts as a natural air conditioner: cold air pooling within the rock voids keeps the interior several degrees cooler than surface air, protecting pikas from heat stress. Burrowing species (such as the plateau pika, Ochotona curzoniae, of the Tibetan Plateau) instead excavate extensive burrow networks in alpine meadow soils. Regardless of strategy, pikas require proximity to diverse, productive meadow vegetation, as they are year-round residents that must accumulate large food stores before winter. Their elevation range commonly spans 2,500–6,130 m above sea level, making them among the highest-dwelling mammals on Earth.

## How do pikas survive winter without hibernating?
Unlike many alpine mammals, pikas do not hibernate. This remarkable strategy places exceptional demands on their summer behaviour. From late spring through early autumn, pikas engage in a behaviour called haypiling: they make repeated foraging trips to surrounding meadows, harvesting grasses, sedges, forbs, thistles, mosses, and wildflowers, then carrying mouthfuls back to their territory boundaries, where they construct haystacks beneath overhanging rocks. A single haystack can contain up to a bushel (roughly 35 litres) of dried vegetation — a critical winter food reserve. Research has revealed a sophisticated chemical ecology in this process: American pikas selectively harvest alpine avens (Geum rossii), a plant that is actually toxic to them when fresh, and layer it into their haypiles because it contains compounds that inhibit bacterial decay, effectively acting as a natural preservative. By the time winter arrives and the toxins have degraded, the avens becomes safe to eat. Pikas also engage in coprophagy — re-ingesting their own soft faecal pellets — to maximise nutrient extraction from tough plant material, a practice shared with rabbits. Under the insulating snowpack, pikas remain active in their talus microhabitats throughout winter, feeding on their cached stores. This dependence on both snowpack insulation and summer food accumulation makes pikas doubly vulnerable to climate change: reduced snowpack exposes them to lethal cold snaps, while shortened growing seasons reduce haypile size.

## Why are pikas threatened by climate change?
Pikas are among the world's most climate-vulnerable mammals. Most species begin to experience physiological heat stress at air temperatures of around 25 °C (77 °F), and research shows that American pikas can die from exposure to temperatures as low as 28 °C (82 °F) when unable to retreat into the talus, with death occurring within two hours under laboratory conditions. Unlike many mountain species that respond to warming by shifting their ranges upslope, pikas already inhabit the highest elevations available to them. At the summit, there is simply nowhere higher to go. The consequences are already measurable. American pikas have vanished from more than a third of their previously documented sites in Oregon and Nevada, representing one of the most extensive modern-era mammal extirpations recorded in the United States. Studies in the Sierra Nevada document habitat loss and fragmentation directly attributable to climate-mediated temperature increases. In Asia, the situation for some species is even more acute. The Ili pika (Ochotona iliensis), endemic to the Tian Shan mountains of China's Xinjiang province, has seen its population decline by more than 70 % since the 1980s and is listed as Endangered by the IUCN (assessed 2018), with fewer than 1,000 individuals believed to survive. Livestock grazing, air pollution, and reduced snowpack compound the climate signal for many Asian species. Because pikas are sensitive, early-responding indicators of warming, ecologists increasingly use their presence and distribution as a biological thermometer for mountain ecosystem health.

## What role do pikas play in mountain ecosystems?
Despite their small size, pikas are ecologically disproportionate. On the Tibetan Plateau, the plateau pika (Ochotona curzoniae) is a keystone species whose burrow networks are fundamental to the functioning of the entire alpine grassland ecosystem. Their burrows aerate and turn over soil, improve water infiltration, and create microsites used for nesting by over 20 species of birds — including ground-nesting passerines and small raptors — as well as lizards and invertebrates. When plateau pika populations have been reduced through government-sponsored poisoning campaigns (aimed at protecting grazing land), the consequences have cascaded through the ecosystem: raptor populations crash, soil structure degrades, and erosion accelerates. Rock-dwelling pikas contribute differently: their haypiling deposits plant material in and around talus, redistributing nutrients and seeds across otherwise barren rocky terrain. As herbivores, pikas also serve as a critical prey base for a wide range of predators. Weasels, stoats, foxes, raptors such as golden eagles and kestrels, and mustelids all depend on pika populations. Their sharp alarm calls — described as a high, nasal 'eenk' — alert not only other pikas but also sympatric species to predator presence, functioning as a multi-species early-warning system. In this way, the pika's ecological role far exceeds what its modest frame might suggest.

## What WARN does
WARN does not currently run projects for pikas, as the organisation's in-country conservation network focuses on Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Brazil, and Colombia — none of which fall within pika habitat. This guide is offered as free educational content. That said, public understanding of climate-driven species loss matters everywhere: the more people grasp how warming temperatures can push mountain specialists to extinction, the stronger the broad societal will to protect wild habitats globally — including those within WARN's network countries.

Mountain ecosystems are warming faster than the global average, and species like the pika — with nowhere higher to retreat — are among the first to pay the price. Supporting WARN helps fund on-the-ground conservation and education that keeps wild habitats — and the species that depend on them — viable for the future.

## Frequently asked questions: Pika
### Are pikas endangered?
It depends on the species. The American pika (Ochotona princeps) is assessed as Least Concern by the IUCN overall (assessed 2016), though several of its subspecies are Vulnerable or Near Threatened and local populations have collapsed. The Ili pika (Ochotona iliensis) is listed as Endangered (assessed 2018), with a population estimated at fewer than 1,000 individuals and a decline of over 70 % since the 1980s. Across the genus, at least four species are classified as Endangered: the Ili pika, Kozlov's pika, Hoffmann's pika, and the silver pika.

### Do pikas hibernate in winter?
No — pikas are one of the few small alpine mammals that remain active all year without hibernating. Instead, they spend their summers building 'haypiles': caches of dried vegetation stored under overhanging rocks that sustain them through winter. They remain active beneath the snowpack, feeding on their stores inside the insulating talus.

### Can pikas survive in warm climates?
No. Most pika species begin to experience heat stress at sustained temperatures above about 25 °C (77 °F). For the American pika, exposure to temperatures as low as 28 °C (82 °F) can be lethal within as little as two hours when the animal cannot retreat into cool talus microhabitats. This physiological intolerance of warmth is the primary reason pikas are considered among the most vulnerable mammals to climate change.

### What do pikas eat?
Pikas are generalist herbivores that feed on a wide variety of alpine plants including grasses, sedges, forbs, wildflowers, thistles, mosses, and lichens. They also practice coprophagy — re-ingesting their soft faecal pellets — to maximise nutrient extraction. For winter stores, they selectively cache certain plant species, including some that are initially toxic but whose toxins degrade over time, effectively preserving the haystack.

### How do pikas communicate?
Pikas are unusually vocal for small mammals. They produce a short, sharp alarm call — often described as 'eenk' or 'ehh-ehh' — to warn neighbours of approaching predators such as weasels, foxes, or raptors. Males also produce longer 'songs' during the breeding season to attract mates and advertise territory. These calls travel effectively across open, rocky terrain and can alert multiple species simultaneously.

### Are pikas related to rabbits?
Yes. Pikas are lagomorphs — members of the order Lagomorpha along with rabbits and hares — not rodents. They share the double upper incisor characteristic of all lagomorphs. However, pikas have evolved a distinctly different body plan: compact, round, with relatively small ears by rabbit standards, without elongated hind legs, and optimised for cold, rocky terrain rather than speed across open ground.

## Sources
- [IUCN Red List — Ili pika (Ochotona iliensis), assessed 2018](https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/pdf/45184315)
- [IUCN Red List — American pika (Ochotona princeps), assessed 2016](https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/41267/45184315)
- [Animal Diversity Web — Ochotona princeps (American pika)](https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Ochotona_princeps/)
- [Animal Diversity Web — Ochotonidae (pikas)](https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Ochotonidae/)
- [U.S. National Park Service — Pikas in Peril](https://www.nps.gov/articles/pikas-in-peril.htm)
- [PLOS ONE — Apparent climate-mediated loss of American pika habitat, Sierra Nevada](https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0181834)
- [Journal of Mammalogy — Conservation status of American pikas (Smith et al. 2020)](https://academic.oup.com/jmammal/article/101/6/1466/5917619)
- [Oryx / Cambridge Core — Dramatic decline of the Ili pika in Xinjiang, China](https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/oryx/article/dramatic-decline-of-the-threatened-ili-pika-ochotona-iliensis-lagomorpha-ochotonidae-in-xinjiang-china/E17F1D13BB71E4D5989E50763B058DAA)
- [Wikipedia — Pika](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pika)
- [Wikipedia — American pika](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_pika)

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Full guide: https://worldanimalrescuenetwork.org/wildlife-guides/pika