Prairie dog and Clark in 1804. Lewis described it in more detail in 1806, calling it the "barking squirrel". On average, these stout-bodied rodents will grow to be between long, including the short tail, and weigh between . Sexual dimorphism in body mass in the prairie dog varies 105 to 136% between the sexes. Among the species, black-tailed prairie dogs tend to be the least sexually dimorphic, and white-tailed prairie dogs tend to be the most sexually dimorphic. Sexual dimorphism peaks during weaning, when the females lose weight and the males start eating more, and is at its lowest when the females
Black-tailed prairie dog activities keep plant development in a suppressed vegetative state with higher nutritional qualities, herbivores, including red deer ("Cervus elaphus"), American bison, pronghorn ("Antilocapra americana"), and domestic cattle often prefer foraging in black-tailed prairie dog colonies. Animals that depend on herbaceous cover in sagebrush habitat, such as mule deer ("Odocoileus hemionus") and sage grouse ("Centrocercus" spp.), may be deterred by the decreased vegetative cover on black-tailed prairie dog colonies. For a list of vertebrate species associated with black-tailed prairie dog colonies, see. Biodiversity in shortgrass prairies may be at risk due to the reductions in distribution and occurrence of black-tailed prairie