Gray Squirrel

Description:

Gray back, white belly tan face. Tail long and bushy. 19" long (red squirrels 13"). Very vocal: chatter and clucking calls.

Habitat:

Broadleaf and mixed woods, towns, parks, birdfeeders. Food: nuts, seeds, inner bark, fruit, sometime bird eggs.

Notes:

We have at least 8 gray squirrels that came to our bird feeder all this winter... it looks like certain branches are part of a "pathways" from their nests to our feeder. Part of that highway is the side of our house. They can scramble up the cedar shingles with ease to our feeding station on the second floor. If I come out on the deck and scare them they leap into the air with abandon and land on the snow running for the nearest tree. Wouldn't take much for them to become flying squirrels.... just a bigger armpit flap. Two red squirrels reside in our woodpile and make a huge racket when the gray squirrels arrive but they don't have any conflicts.