Colorado Research Lab Has Turned to Onlyfans to Raise Money After Federal Funding Cuts, Generating Over $5,000 for a Long-running Marmot

Biologist Dr Daniel Blumstein, who heads the Marmot Project at the UCLA-affiliated Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory in Colorado, launched the account in "an act of desperation" after federal funding to universities was cut. The platform, known mostly for sexually explicit content, now hosts family-friendly videos of yellow-bellied marmots scurrying and popping out of burrows. After OnlyFans takes its share, the lab will make about $4,000. The Marmot Project, running for over 60 years, is the second-longest study of individually identified mammals in the world, after Jane Goodall's chimpanzee study in Tanzania.

Blumstein said long-term studies are effective but he has been unable to secure federal support. The idea came to him while watching the TV show Margot's Got Money Troubles, where a character starts an OnlyFans account. He and his students named the account OnlyMarms.

A snag occurred when the platform flagged his driver's licence photo because he didn't look like the profile photo of a marmot, but an email exchange resolved it. The lab also launched Fat Marmot Week, styled after Fat Bear Week, where the public votes for their favourite rotund rodent at the end of August. It's fun to root for the chunkiest marmot, but behind the fun and games is a deathly serious competition against nature to pile on fat to survive the long, cold winter, Blumstein said.