AbstractAimGrazing intensity and fire patterns across the Eurasian steppes have changed dramatically over the past decades due to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, and Kazakhstan is now a global fire hotspot. The implications of these changes for ecosystem functioning are largely unclear. We aimed to understand the effects of changed grazing intensity and fire frequency on a key ecosystem engineer, the yellow ground squirrelSpermophilus fulvus, on a very large scale.LocationKazakhstan.MethodsGround squirrels were surveyed in an area of ca. 100,000 ha in the dry steppe of central Kazakhstan, using hierarchical distance sampling at more than 200 random points, stratified by fire frequency and livestock grazing intensity. We modelled abundance as a function of different variables, grouped at the landscape scale (fire and grazing), meso‐scale (soil and vegetation structure) and at burrow scale (plant traits such as palatability, digestibility and nutrient content).ResultsGround squirrels prefer areas of a high wormwood cover (Artemisiaspp.) and high plant species richness, which are moderately grazed, preferably by cattle, with only rare fire occurrence. High squirrel densities were also related to the availability of nitrogen‐rich plants of high nutritional value for herbivores.Main ConclusionsYellow ground squirrels seem to reach their density optima by balancing trade‐offs between optimal foraging in areas of short, nutrient‐rich vegetation and a good visibility of approaching predators. Post‐Soviet changes in grazing pressure, resulting in higher fire recurrence rates due to grass encroachment and litter accumulation (i.e. fuel for wildfire), have likely affected the abundance of burrowing mammals and associated biodiversity across huge parts of the Eurasian steppes and semideserts.