Squirrels

Trish Lynn and Thom Donitz with friends.

The JOLT News Staff

You see them everywhere. Squirrels. For the most part everyone loves them, although sometimes they can, like any other member of the rodent family, be destructive, but for the most part we love them. 

Watching them play, chase each other, talk to each other and even interact with us from time to time.  Animal lovers will erect feeders, signage, statues and more. Just drive down to Longview and just to the northwest of RA Long Square, along Olympia Way, you will encounter the Amos Peters Squirrel Statue followed by the Nutty Narrows Bridge. This is an actual miniature narrows bridge that spans the width of the road so squirrels can safely cross. 

But what do we really know about these members of the family Sciuridae? A family that includes chipmunks, tree squirrels, flying squirrels and ground squirrels, including the massive Hoary marmots found up and around Mount Rainier.  These are the largest members of the squirrel family and can weigh between 10 to 20 pounds with a length of over 30 inches!  Imagine one of those asking you for a peanut.

Luckily, squirrels are generally small animals with slender bodies and bushy tails with large eyes. We have all seen their soft and shimmery fur with large eyes. Tree squirrels, in particular, have versatile, sturdy claws which, unlike most mammals, enable them to descend a tree headfirst. They actually rotate their ankles 180 degrees, enabling them to point their feet backwards and grip the tree from the opposite direction. 

While having large eyes enable squirrels to have excellent vision along with large teeth in the front for gnawing and a back set for grinding, it is their tails that are truly remarkable. In bad weather their tail keeps the cold wind and rain off, while in hot weather it actually works to keep them cool.

It serves a dual purpose when jumping by acting as a counterbalance and even a small parachute. They often use it to signal each other and as a defense mechanism. When they sit up, they fold it up their back to foil any would be predators from behind. 

In Washington, we have seven different tree squirrels of which only four are native: western gray, Douglas, red and the northern flying squirrel.  The non-native species include the fox, California ground and, of course, the eastern gray squirrel.  This is the one we are most familiar with its light gray coat with a reddish-brown mixture on their face, back and tail.

They were first introduced to Washington in 1925 and now thrive in developed areas, while encroaching into some forests and native squirrel habitat.  In cities, suburbs and oak woodlands, gray squirrels usually displace the native Douglas squirrels.

In higher elevations or mature conifer forests, Douglas squirrels remain secure. Douglas squirrels usually hold their ground in deep conifer forests, but they lose advantage in fragmented areas where gray squirrels thrive and are more generalist in diet— acorns, nuts, seeds, fungi, fruits and even garden crops. Less dependent on conifer cones than Douglas squirrels. 

Let us now concentrate on our native squirrels. While being the most wide spread of the four, and found throughout the forested parts of the state, the northern flying squirrels are the most difficult to see as they are nocturnal and sleep in their nests during the day. 

The red squirrel, while looking somewhat like his cousin, Douglas, has a reddish-brown coat with a thin black line separating it from his white underbelly. While predominately in the eastern part of the state, its territory overlaps with Douglas squirrel in the Northern Cascades. 

The western gray squirrel is the largest tree squirrel native to the Pacific Northwest, beautiful with its salt and pepper, almost streel gray fur on the back with a white underbelly. Easily distinguished by their long and bushy, white-edged tails with large feet and ears that turn reddish-brown in the winter. 

Now this gorgeous animal is limited to just three small areas in Washington.  Continued threats to this species include habitat loss due to urbanization and deforestation, inconsistent food supplies, disease and mortality resulting from roadkill and illegal hunting. 

Which brings us back to one of our favorites, the handsome Douglas squirrel. The Douglas is easily identified by their dark color on the back with reddish or brownish gray on the sides and orange on their underbelly separated by a thin black line between the two.

Their diet is heavily dependent on conifer seeds.  They clip off cones, dry them in “middens” (piles), and cache seeds for the winter. They also eat fungi, berries, tender shoots, and occasionally insects or bird eggs. Their rattling “chur” calls are often heard defending food stores or nesting sites. 

Douglas squirrels are still common and not endangered, but their strong tie to old-growth forests means logging and habitat loss affect them more than grays. The most fascinating thing we notice in Douglas squirrels, is the way this small creature chases the larger gray squirrel away. They do not mess with Douglas squirrels at all. 

In Washington, the western gray squirrel was listed as a threatened species in 1993 and was reclassified as endangered in 2023. 

Western gray, Douglas, red and northern flying squirrels are all protected species in Washington. 

A squirrel is a creature of boundless energy, a flash of fur, a flick of tail, a tiny woodland acrobat. Their biggest contribution to the forest is in shaping plant composition. 

Paws for thoughts 

While it was John James Audubon who noted “their boldness and noisy scolding on intruders,” it was John Muir who described the talkative Douglas as “by far the most interesting and influential of the Sciuridae.”

Thom Donitz and Trish Lynn are neighbors and close friends who share their love of animals and wildlife. Trish and Thom are residents of Tumwater. Contact them at  pets@theJOLTnews.com.