Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio, Hey brain Stuff Lauren fog Obam. Here. The American red squirrel comes, as advertised, somewhat found in the Rocky Mountains parts of Alaska, southern and central Canada, the Great Lakes region, and the northeastern United States. This rodent is as American and Canadian as it gets. True to its common name. The animal does have some rusty red fur. Yet the American red squirrel does certain things that may surprise you. We're talking
nest rating, bird eating and premeditated infanticide. It's a squirrel eat squirrel world out there. Zoologists have tallied up more than two hundred distinct squirrel species, from the African pygmy squirrel to the Indian giant squirrel. If you live in the eastern or midwestern United States, then you're probably most familiar with the Eastern gray squirrel. Both Kentucky and North Carolina recognize the Eastern gray as their official state mammal.
While all white and all black individuals aren't unheard of in the Eastern Gray, these squirrels tend to be grayford with light underbellies. Contrast this with the American red squirrel it's got a light underbelly as well, but we think you'll agree that the backside is more vibrant. Red brown to red gray fur covers the head, tail, and back, along with most of the available skin on all four legs.
You might notice black stripes running down each flank. When present, these lines form a boundary between some of the darker hairs on top and lighter ones coating the belly. Like the Eastern gray, the American red squirrel has a ring of white fur around both eyes. Eastern gray squirrels grow to about fifteen to twenty inches that's forty long. American reds are about two thirds that size, measuring between eleven and fourteen inches that's twenty eight and thirty six centimes
from twitching snout to bushy tail. But don't mistake the American red squirrel for timid little pushover. On the contrary, this is one aggressive rodent. Red squirrels are notorious for rating bird feeders. In the process, they won't hesitate to chase away Eastern grays, but despite their size disadvantage, the same species encounters can also get testy. By and large. Red squirrels live alone and just nine to eleven weeks old, they'll begin to stake out territories covering up to eight
full acres that's just over three hectors. Not all territories are fully private. Red squirrels living in New York State have been known to share portions of their stomping grounds with their neighbors, and the mother squirrel in poor health might surrender some real estate to her offspring. Nevertheless, in the vast majority of cases, American red squirrels do not tolerate intruders, but like a lot of mammals, the squirrels
use scents to help mark their territories. Uninvited guests are met with a hostile buzzing noise, and sometimes the owner of the turf will shake its tail and stamp its feet to make itself moretening. The squirrels are quite vocal around predators, too. Barks and other sounds act as alarm calls raised when they see a dangerous carnivore, and they have enemies to spare. Foxes, wolves, weasels, lynx, coyotes, crows, birds of prey, and timber Rattlesnakes all hunt this squirrel
in the wild. Granted, red squirrels do their fair share of hunting as well. Young birds sometimes fall prey to the tree climbing rodents, as do unhatched bird eggs and insects. A red squirrels will devour baby snowshoe hares when the chance arises, but they're omnivores. Mushrooms are a favorite treats. Sometimes these require a bit of prep work. Red squirrels have been known to pluck mushrooms at ground level and then hang them out to dry on tree branches before
chowing down sap. Tree bark, fruits and flowers also factor into the red squirrel's diet. However, seeds are their main source of food. The species typically lives in coniferous and deciduous forests. In such places, it's easy to find conifer cones loaded with rodent friendly seeds, so the red squirrels living there tend to keep lots of these cones in storage spots called middens. A midden can take the form of an underground hiding spot or a heap of cones
lying beside a tree trunk. American red squirrels are both a blessing and a curse for the trees that sustain them. In the negative column, they can cause serious damage to trees by stripping their bark away. Over harvesting cones is another potential problem, and yet the squirrels are also really good at spreading those cones around. They don't always recover middens after building them up, which leaves the cone seeds
to germinate and grow. Food Caches are a winter time necessity for many American red squirrels, as the species does not hibernate, but ironically, bountiful harvests can spell doom for newborn red squirrels. White spruce trees produce a greater than average number of cones in certain years, which botanists call mast heere. During a masked year, female red squirrels are more likely to have two litters of pups instead of
just one, which gives male squirrels a horrifying opportunity. In the journal Ecology published a study documenting sexually selected infanticide in American red squirrels early one masked. Here, the authors observed several wild males slaughtering newborns fathered by their rivals.
The tactic is intended to make mother squirrels reproductively available again, and it works after a female's first litter is killed, the murderous male can move in and sire his own pups with her funny how that never came up in the old Screwry squirrel cartoons. Today's episode is based on the article the American Red squirrel is small, territorial and aggressive on how stuffworks dot Com, written by Mark Bancini.
Brain Stuff is a production of by Heart Radio in partnership with how stuff works dot Com and is produced by Tyler Clang. Four more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. H