Welcome To Amarillo, Home of the Sod Poodle

I had someone hit us up on our App with the question of the year. Bless their heart being new to the Panhandle and Texas in general but a valid one at that:

What the heck is a sod poodle? I know its a baseball team with some kind of animal, but what is it?

I'm not born and raised Amarillo, I do happen to be native Texan by way of El Paso with stops in Wofforth (Lubbock), Austin and San Antonio. I've seen the bright lights of Houston plenty of times and been out on the sea walls in Galveston and Corpus more than I care to count. Dallas? well... let's just say I'm fine staying off the PGBT. Amarillo, with it it's great folk and play on the prairie dog name, sod poodle have already claimed a special spot in my heart that just has me happy to call this place home. Enough of my story, here's what y'all came for.

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Meet the Sod Poodle

The Sod Poodle is nothing more than the Amarillo way of saying Prairie Dog. This fine animal is actually part of the ground squirrel family. One of the big differences between it and it's tree cousins is they aren't solitary animals, They live in colonies in the ground, have less of a bushy tail and are a little bit larger. The name is a play on Prairie Dog with synonyms.

Looking For Sod Poodles Around Town

There are plenty of colonies around the city where you can spot a sod poodle. They have been known to pop up at John Stiffs Park, Wildcat Bluff, Along Soncy where 9th/Wolflin dead ends, Hunsley and Washington Street or downtown in a much bigger form:

Sod Poodles Baseball

Yep, Minor League Baseball saw a relocation of the San Antonio Missions to the newly built Hodgetown Stadium downtown. Clearly Missions works well for San Antonio but not so much Amarillo in the middle of the Golden Spread. After much debate and fan voting the name Sod Poodle was born and applied to the franchise. Ruckus the mascot is the embodiment of all things Sod Poodle.

Welcome to Amarillo!  All of us including our native sod poodles are glad you're here! Now there's plenty of other critters you should know about. Take a look