Squirrels

It's amazing that the longer we live in the mountains, the less we tend to see. For instance, how often have you noticed a group of elk off to the side of the road and not even slowed down to give them any particular notice? Often, when you talk to locals, they seem to know more about grizzly bears (an animal they may have never even seen) than they do of the more common animals like elk, or even squirrels.

I, like most people, have been equally guilty of this. Occasionally though, something will jolt me out of my complacency. For instance, I was up at Ribbon Lake recently when, all of a sudden, the local four footed, red tailed guardian of that part of the forest let go with his loud chipping call. Normally I would simply ignore this slight verbal abuse and continue on however, this particular squirrel seemed unusually determined to make sure I left. Like many basically stubborn people, the more someone, or something, wants me to leave, the less likely I am to do so.

As the squirrel became less and less tolerant of my presence his techniques slowly progressed to more and more belligerent methods. At first, he simply stood on a prominent branch, looked me square in the eye and very loudly warned me that I had stepped right into the middle of his territory. As this didn't seem to be working, he became more bold. He walked right out to the end of a large branch and suddenly did something that I had never before seen. He held on tightly with his front paws and then began to move his rear legs up and down in tandem in such a way that it reminded me of an old fashioned sewing machine. As a result, the whole branch began swaying in time with his rhythmic movements. His strategy here seemed to be similar to that employed by many other animals--by moving the whole branch, he could appear much larger and therefore, much more threatening.

This went on for about ten minutes and while I sat there marvelling at his persistence, I began to wonder at this small furry animal. I'd remembered walking through a lodgepole pine forest one day when I suddenly found myself amidst a flurry of falling cones. Upon further investigation, I found a squirrel rapidly running through the top of the tree and cutting off all of the cone bearing branches. These would be collected later and become part of the squirrels winter food supply.

Since they are largely cone eaters, they tend to eat their cones in one spot, known as a midden, or garbage pile. Sometimes you can find huge middens several metres in size and riddled with a number of holes. Contrary to popular belief, the squirrels usually nest on the ground, below their midden. These holes form each of several entrances, in case a hasty exit is required, and they will store their cones within the midden to keep them fat during the winter.