Where have all the red squirrels gone?
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- Published on Friday, February 19, 2016
Submitted by Ken Kingdon
Riding Mountain Biosphere Reserve
Plunkety, plink, plink. My daughter Abbey got a ukulele from ol’ Santy himself this Christmas and I’ve been plucking away at it in my spare time.
And if you don’t recognise the opening bars of the iconic 1960s folk song “Where have all the flowers gone?” I don’t blame you. It might be my technique.
Or it could be because I’ve rewritten it to “Where have all the red squirrels gone?”
It’s a bit of a mystery. We were away for about a week over New Years, and when we got back, our two red squirrels seemed to have disappeared.
I was tempted to suggest alien abduction. Then, after sober second thought, I decided no alien in their right minds would want a red squirrel running around their spaceship, chewing on wires, pulling insulation out of the walls, and chattering away.
In my post-holiday haze, admittedly, I didn’t even realise that the squirrels had disappeared for at least a week after our return. The weather had turned cold, with daytime highs of -20º C and I just assumed that the squirrels were holed up somewhere warm and cosy.
But, given that at least one of them would show up eyeballing the bird feeder on even the coldest days, I finally figured something was amiss.
And, losing one squirrel is odd, but losing two in less than a week is downright mysterious.
Another point of clarification. When I refer to the two squirrels, I don’t want you to think that they were friends or anything. The big squirrel seemed happiest when it was trying to kill the smaller one. Like siblings.
Nor, as is the case in most things in this world, did the two squirrels equally share their resources. The big one could be classified as the “have” squirrel, and the other “have-not.”
The poorer “have-not” squirrel was stuck living on the south side of the house, well away from the bird feeder.
It only had about six spruce trees to depend upon for cones and shelter, although the one thing it had going for it was an abundance of hazel shrubs.
The “have” squirrel definitely had more resources. With at least 20 spruces to choose from, plus a bird feeder, a couple of sheds to call home and also an abundance of hazel, this squirrel was the Donald Trump of rodents.
But evidently even the Trumps of the world can have troubles. “Have” squirrel was suffering from a change in management– this fall, I changed how I fed the birds, making it harder for a squirrel to steal sunflower seeds. And then we went on vacation for a week and left the birds and squirrels to their own devices.
As I pondered the squirrels’ disappearance, I first wondered about predators like fishers or pine martens. We’ve had them go through the yard before, but they never seemed to cut down on the squirrel population. And there hadn’t been any fresh signs of fishers or martens in the yard for a while.
As an alternative, could both squirrels have decided to up and move? It’s possible, but squirrels are highly territorial, and will fight to the death to hold onto their homes. So a squirrel would find it hard to move into an area where there was already a resident squirrel. And, in our part of the country, pretty much every territory is occupied. Or at least they had been.
On my snowshoe routes this year, I’ve been noticing a general lack of squirrel sign. It seems to me that it was not only my squirrels that disappeared.
In the end, I think that many squirrels have run out of food. I have written before about my non-scientific surveys of spruce tree cones and hazelnuts.
Interestingly, this year was the least productive that I have seen in my 10 years of looking at these crops. I didn’t see a single spruce tree with new cones on it this year, and the production of hazel nuts was the poorest I’ve seen.
Squirrels are well known for being hoarders. They will lay in enough supplies for up to two years, hiding cones, nuts, seeds, and mushrooms in all sorts of nooks and crannies. But even these larders can be emptied in times of scarcity. And that is what the squirrels might be facing• last year wasn’t a real productive year for nuts and cones either, and so I think that many squirrels have used up a lot of their reserves. Not that I’m saying all the squirrels are starving. Last summer, I found a hazel shrub with 26 nuts on it (close to an all-time high), and if you were a squirrel lucky enough to have a few of those shrubs in your territory, you’re probably doing fine.
Or, you could live next to a constantly stocked bird feeder. Hmmm I think that actually works. Sing along, everyone: “Gone to bird feeders every one. When will they ever learn? When will they e-v-e-r learn?…” Plink. Plank. Plunk.
