Orcasional Musings | Squirrels? What about them?

||| ORCASIONAL MUSINGS BY STEVE HENIGSON |||

A recent trip down to Seattle, for a cousin’s full-house Thanksgiving feast, causes me to muse on the family Sciuridae, those rats in designer couture who populate our trees, and who empty our bird feeders with impudent impunity.

Seattle’s squirrels are very different from ours. The big city has western gray squirrels, Sciurus griseus (“squirrel gray”), the largest native squirrel on the west coast, with a gray back and a white belly. They eat all of the usual squirrelly things: nuts, berries, seeds, and the eggs of smaller birds if they can get to them. They’re ready to reproduce in just under one year, and drop a litter in about a month-and-a-half, but their kits need almost six months to wean, so mama gray squirrel always looks a little frazzled and overworked.

Orcasian tree rats are mostly fox squirrels, Sciurus niger (“squirrel black”), an exotic import not merely from the mainland, but from the eastern United States. The fox squirrel is the third largest of all native North American rodents, losing out only to the beaver and the porcupine, and, notwithstanding its assigned Latin name, no part of the Orcas variety is anywhere black. To the previous list of edible delights, fox squirrels add acorns and pine nuts, fruit, farmed corn and soybeans, bulbs and tubers, and even roots. They are ready to reproduce as quickly as are gray squirrels, but the kits wean in only three months, which probably makes female fox squirrels happy to be who they are.

While the gray squirrel is, by preference, arboreal, the fox squirrel spends a lot of time on the ground, and ventures boldly into the grassland and cropland which borders the forest. This makes the fox squirrel vulnerable to predators, in particular hawks, eagles, owls, dogs, cats, and fast-moving automobiles. Drive slowly, and be kind to your bushy-tailed friends, for that squirrel may be somebody’s mother.

Although the fox squirrel was introduced onto our island by somebody, we are sure of neither by whom nor when. The intention was most probably to provide both sport and pot meat, since fox squirrels give the conscientious hunter intriguing difficulties, but are rewardingly delicious to eat. The fox squirrel lives comfortably in close proximity to man, and, indeed, can be tamed, and makes a personable and entertaining pet. One volunteered to be our close friend, many years ago, in exchange for the occasional peanut foraged from a shirt pocket.

The fox squirrel is not the only Orcasional tree rodent. There is also the miniature version, the Douglas squirrel, Tamiasciurus douglasii (“treasurer-squirrel of douglas”), named for the same guy who gave us the Douglas fir. The Douglas squirrel earns its half-Greek name by hoarding pine nuts in its treasury, the usual squirrelly holes in the ground. You can tell when a Douglas squirrel has been around by the heaps of disassembled pine-cone parts left here and there.

Douglas squirrels are darker than usual, here on this island, and some have tails which verge on the black. They are also extremely quick, causing me to think of them as “swifties,” since calling them “speedy” could lead to an unpleasant ethnic slur. Small they may be, but they are also feisty. When one of them is at its dinner, woe betide the huge fox squirrel who might want to share the feast.

More than 20 years ago, Douglas squirrels were found mostly in Moran State Park. I’d never seen one before, so I described the little beast to a Park Ranger, and asked what it was.

“Beats me,” was his answer. “I see ’em, but I have no idea what they’re called.”

Now, they seem to have migrated westward. We have one who lives with us, under the front steps, and another who lives nearby. They’re probably a breeding pair. At least, I hope so.