Squirrels at the Feeder

Squirrels are busy animals. When it is nice outside, it is hard to go anywhere or spend more than a minute looking out your window without seeing a squirrel.  While these animals are busy throughout the warmer months, where do they go in the winter? Do squirrels hibernate?

Trees squirrels like the Gray, Fox and Red squirrels do not hibernate but many ground squirrels do.  Ground squirrels are “light sleepers” and will often come out of hibernation for short periods of time.  The Arctic Ground Squirrel is a serious sleeper that truly hibernates for up to eight months!

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If you have looked out in the yard and seen squirrels chasing each other, they may not be fighting or playing. The chase may be part of the courtship process.

Squirrels chase each other for a variety of reasons. Young squirrels chase each other for fun while older squirrels chase each other to assert dominance in the mating process.  When a squirrel population gets too crowded then they will chase each other to protect the limited food supply. 

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Most people know that squirrels like to eat peanuts and acorns but what about bird eggs? Squirrels are omnivores, which means that they eat both plants and meat.

Squirrels will absolutely eat bird eggs!  Squirrels are routinely seen raiding birds nests in tress and even stealing eggs from chicken coops.  Eggs are a natural part of a squirrel’s diet but squirrels have not been shown to significantly impact bird populations.

If you are worried about squirrels in your neighborhood dining on bird eggs, take a moment to learn more about the typical squirrel diet.

Squirrels Eat Almost Anything

Squirrels naturally look for nuts and native plants to fill their bellies. However, squirrels eat almost anything. The foods that they tend to look for include acorns, tree bark, flowers, fruits, vegetables, insects, and various plants. [Read more…]

Squirrels are agile animals. They can easily scurry up a tree or fence. Flying squirrels can even leap great distances through the air.  While squirrels can perform many amazing feats there ability to swim is something that doesn’t get much publicity.

Squirrels are not great swimmers but can swim when needed.  Gray, Fox and Red squirrels can swim a doggy paddle stroke using their tails as a rudder.  Flying squirrels are much weaker swimmers as their gliding webbing is a hindrance in the water.

Squirrels Can Perform a Doggy Paddle

Similar to most land mammals, most squirrels can dog paddle through the water. Sometimes they use their tails to help steer.  While squirrels are not efficient swimmers you can often spot them swimming across lakes and other large bodies of water.

Performing the dog paddle requires a lot of energy to travel a short distance.

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Similar to most animals, squirrels avoid humans, dogs, and cats as much as they can. However, if they feel cornered and threatened with nowhere to turn, they may attempt to bite.  If you or your pet get bit by a squirrel then at some point you must have wondered if squirrels carry rabies.

Squirrels rarely carry rabies and there have been no documented cases of squirrels transmitting rabies to humans in the United States.  Bites from squirrels are not considered a rabies risk unless the squirrel was acting abnormally and there is an outbreak of rabies in other animals in the local area.

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With the abundance of squirrels in most neighborhoods, it is easy to assume that these wild animals have a lot of babies throughout the year. However, it turns out that squirrels only mate twice during the year, once in the Late Winter/ Early Spring and again in the Late Summer.  The babies are typically born about 44 days later.

Grey and Fox Squirrels usually have one litter of babies in March.  Older female squirrels will often produce a second litter of babies in August. Two to five is the average number of squirrels born to a mother but there are differences between the various types of squirrels and the regions where they live. 

The following details explore the mating habits, gestation periods, and life cycles of squirrels and their babies.

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