Photo by A. S. Rudland & Sons.
ASIATIC CHIPMUNKS.
Small ground-squirrels which store food for the winter.
The grey-and-black squirrel of the United States was thus described some sixty years ago: "It rises with the sun, and continues industriously engaged in the search for food for four or five hours every morning. During the warm weather of spring it prepares its nest on the branch of a tree, constructing it first of dried sticks, which it breaks off, or, if these are not at hand, of green twigs as thick as a finger, which it gnaws off from the boughs. These it lays in the fork of a tree, so as to make a framework. It lines this framework with leaves, and over these again it spreads moss. In making the nest, the pair is usually engaged for several days, spending an hour in the morning hard at work. The noise they make in cutting the sticks and carrying material is heard at some distance." In winter they reside entirely in the holes of trees, where their young are in most cases born. Green corn and young wheat suffered greatly from their depredations, and a wholesale war of destruction used to be waged against them everywhere. In Pennsylvania an old law offered threepence a head from the public treasury for every squirrel destroyed, and in 1749 the enormous sum of £8,000 was paid out of the public funds for this purpose. In those days vast migrations of these squirrels used to take place, exciting not only the wonder but the fear of the old settlers. In the Far North-west multitudes of squirrels used to congregate in different districts, forming scattered bands, which all moved in an easterly direction, gathering into larger bodies as they went. Neither mountains nor rivers stopped them. On they came, a devouring army, laying waste the corn- and wheat-fields, until guns, cats, hawks, foxes, and owls destroyed them.
Photo by W. P. Dando] [Regent's Park.
RED-FOOTED GROUND-SQUIRREL.
This species has some of the characteristics of the tree-squirrels, among them the bushy tail.
The Flying-squirrels.
One of the finest squirrels is the Taguan, a large squirrel of India, Ceylon, and the Malacca forests. It is a "flying-squirrel," with a body 2 feet long, and a bushy tail of the same length. Being nocturnal, it is not often seen; but when it leaps it unfolds a flap of skin on either side, which is stretched (like a sail) when the fore and hind limbs are extended in the act of leaping; it then forms a parachute. The colour of this squirrel is grey, brown, and pale chestnut. There are a number of different flying-squirrels in China, Formosa, and Japan, and in the forests of Central America. One small flying-squirrel, the Polatouche, is found in North-east Russia and Siberia. It flies from tree to tree with immense bounds, assisted by the "floats" on its sides. Though only 6 inches long, it can cover distances of 30 feet and more without difficulty. Wherever there are birch forests this little squirrel is found. One nearly as small is a native of the Southern States of America, ranging as far south as Guatemala.