Batman suits and cowboy outfits: a prairie dog’s life in Thailand

Cartoon is a black-tailed prairie dog who does indeed look cartoonish. Dressed in a miniature handmade costume of a rodeo rider, the rodent resembles a raffish character from a Disney animal adventure.

He sports a faux-leather vest with embroidered chaps, and perched jauntily on his head is a little brown Stetson with a chin strap, hat band and tiny silver sheriff’s star.

Until a minute ago the prairie dog also had a pair of goggles on, but he’s lost them in the grass while foraging, nuzzling up to other prairie dogs and taking a keen interest in random objects.

Occasionally Cartoon rises up on his hind legs to take a good look around. When he does that, you half expect him to whistle for his bronco and set out on some caper.

Instead, owner Raweepach Promboot, a Bangkok shop assistant, scoops Cartoon up in her arms and pets him lovingly. “He’s cute and smart,” she says . “He doesn’t bite or misbehave or complain when I pick him up.”

Raweepach, who is in her mid-20s, has four other prairie dogs. She has brought two of them, Cartoon and Tonkhao (“Rice Plant”), to a picturesque botanical garden on the outskirts of Bangkok, where local Thai prairie dog enthusiasts gather each weekend with their pets for a spot of socialising.