Every summer, a crew of “marmoteers” heads out to catch, tag, and watch these critters as they go about their lives. And you might wonder: What could a marmot possibly have to complain about?

Well, it turns out, quite a bit.

Marmots are built for tough mountain living. They’ve spent generations getting just right for cold winters, short summers, and snowy burrows. But now things are changing fast, mostly because of us. The weather’s shifting, snow isn’t as reliable, and that throws a wrench into what used to work just fine. Biologists call this a “mismatch” — kind of like how we’re wired to crave sugar and fat because they used to be rare, but now that they’re everywhere, too much of a good thing can cause trouble.

Take winter, for instance. A healthy marmot spends the summer stuffing itself full of plants, doubling its weight so it can sleep through about five months of hibernation. During that time, it barely moves, keeps its body just above freezing, and burns fat very slowly — about the weight of a paperclip each day. But here’s the catch: They need a good blanket of snow over their burrows to stay insulated. In years with little snow, the ground gets colder, and they burn through their fat faster. Run out of fat, and they don’t make it. Even the ones that survive may be too worn down to have babies come spring.

Now, you might think earlier snowmelt and longer summers would help. And in some ways, it does — marmots can grow bigger with more time to eat. But there’s a trade-off. The longer they’re out above ground, the more chances predators have to catch them. So while they may be getting fatter, they might also be turning into easy meals for foxes, coyotes, badgers, and maybe wolves again before long.

Then there’s drought. Marmots rely on lush summer plants, especially toward the end of the season when they’re packing on fat for winter. In dry years, the food just isn’t there, and they head into hibernation underweight, which makes surviving the winter that much harder.

And on top of all that, we humans are crowding into their home turf. More hikers, more cabins, more cars. Our presence changes how marmots behave, makes it harder for them to spot predators, and sometimes cuts off how they interact with each other. Worst of all, cars and trucks kill them outright — something marmots never had to deal with in their long history.

So if you’re driving through marmot country, take it slow. And before you pull away from a trailhead, give your vehicle a quick check — these little guys sometimes crawl into warm engines, and you don’t want to give one an accidental road trip.

Life has never been easy in the high mountains, but these days, marmots have a whole new set of problems to deal with.