Nature: Sighting of fox squirrel came with a colorful twist

This melanistic fox squirrel appeared in the writer's backyard on January 9/Jim McCormac

 A normally colored eastern fox squirrel/Jim McCormac

Sighting of fox squirrel came with a colorful twist

Columbus Dispatch

January 19, 2020

NATURE
Jim McCormac

Four species of tree squirrels reside in Ohio, and all have their charms.

The smallest and least known is the southern flying squirrel. It is common but seldom seen because of its strictly nocturnal habits.

Slightly bigger is the red squirrel, which occurs statewide but is more localized than other squirrels. It has a distinct preference for coniferous trees.

Most common is the well-known eastern gray squirrel, the typical squirrel of parks and suburbia in this area. Those who feed backyard birds wage war with this mammal. The squirrels often win.

Then there is the largest squirrel of all, the gorgeous eastern fox squirrel. A whopper can weigh 3 pounds and stretch 3 feet or more from nose to outstretched tail tip. If there were a beauty pageant for squirrels, this one might wear the tiara.

They are foxy indeed, with underparts tinted in showy burnt-orange. The upper pelage is a lovely grayish-black.

From my experience, gray squirrels far outnumber foxes in Columbus and its neighborhoods. The latter becomes more common in rural areas.

I recently moved to Worthington, an area I have long been acquainted with. Gray squirrels are abundant, but I have never seen a fox squirrel in my neighborhood — until Jan. 9.

That morning, I glanced out a back window to see a huge black squirrel sitting prominently on an open snag. It was as if it was posing for me. I usually keep a camera with a big telephoto lens at the ready, in case something bizarre appears at the feeders. Photographic prep paid dividends in this case.

Not only did I document the yard’s first fox squirrel, but it also was a rare melanistic morph, or form. My first thought was that it was a melanistic gray squirrel, but the massive size and tinges of orange bleeding through on the animal’s underside gave it away.

Black forms are far more common in gray squirrels, and in some parts of Columbus such animals are local celebrities. Melanin-enhanced fox squirrels seem to be virtually unknown, at least in Ohio. I have many biologically literate friends, and not one has said they have seen a black fox squirrel.

Melanistic fox squirrels are known to occur, just in far fewer numbers than grays. Most black fox squirrels appear in the southern reaches of the range, which spans the eastern half of the U.S. Conversely, melanism in gray squirrels is more prolific in the northern parts of its distribution.

Although the genetic mechanisms that produce melanism in squirrels is well-understood, the role of environmental factors that favor melanism, and possible gene flow between fox and gray squirrels, is lesser known.

I have not seen the dusky fox squirrel since the day I discovered it. Maybe it’s the vanguard of a wave to come, or it was a flash in the pan. Such animals would certainly enrich our squirrel diversity, that’s for sure.

Naturalist Jim McCormac writes a column for The Dispatch on the first, third and fifth Sundays of the month. He also writes about nature at www.jimmccormac.blogspot.com.

A melanistic fox squirrel

As always, click the photo to enlarge

Right time, right place. I happened to glance out the porch windows into the backyard this afternoon, and was stunned to see a huge black squirrel perched prominently 25 feet away. It was the only time all afternoon that I glanced out there. My first reaction was to grab my big telephoto, which I often leave set up on a tripod for emergency situations. Unfortunately, I had to shoot the beast through a window, but the images came out okay in spite of that.

While my initial thought was that the unusually pigmented animal was a melanistic gray squirrel, as soon as I looked closer I rethought that identification. This squirrel was noticeably larger and chunkier than several nearby gray squirrels (Sciurus carolinensis), and through the lens I could see its interesting orangish cast, caused by underlying hairs. This orangish tint is especially apparent on the squirrel's belly, face, and eye ring.

It was a melanistic fox squirrel, Sciurus niger! I had heard of such a thing, but had never before clapped eyes on one. I've seen many melanistic gray squirrels, and have written about them HERE. Indeed, at my annual forays at NettieBay Lodge and vicinity in northern Michigan, this is the common form of gray squirrel. Here in Ohio, "black" grays are far less common, but there are numerous enclaves scattered about. Melanistic gray squirrels appear glossier and more uniformly black than does this one, with a less robust tail, head and neck, and a skinnier gestalt. A typical fox squirrel is a beautiful mammal, with a deeply orange pelage. HERE is a post about them from long ago.

Much has been written about melanism in Sciurus squirrels, at least the two eastern species, fox and gray. Here's an especially detailed and wonky paper should you wish to learn more - just CLICK HERE. Sometimes, populations or individuals of "white" gray squirrels occur, such as the famous white squirrels of Brevard, North Carolina (CLICK HERE for more). I made a special detour last year to see those squirrels, and will have to write about them sometime. I'm not sure if "white" fox squirrels occur regularly.

Anyway, today's oddity fox squirrel was especially odd to me, as I know of no population of variant color morphs of squirrels anywhere around here - Worthington, Ohio. I'm told there are some colonies of melanistic gray squirrels in and around Columbus, but I've not seen any. This was also the first fox squirrel in this yard, to my knowledge. This little slice of suburbia is full of typically colored gray squirrels, and I just posted a cute photo of one a few days ago, HERE. There is even a pair of eastern red squirrels, Tamiasciurus hudsonicus, constantly tearing around here. But never one of the big, comparatively clumsy fox squirrels. And the first one turns out to be a real standout. I kept a close watch for the black/fox squirrel the rest of the afternoon, but did not see him again. I hope he becomes a regular.

NOTE: Regular color variants of an animal - such as this fox squirrel, gray squirrels, or rough-legged hawks, or snow geese - are correctly termed morphs, not phases. Morphs are stable, occur regularly, and do not change or shift color. If they are black, or white, they will remain black or white throughout their lives. Phase indicates a shift or change in development over time, such as in a phase of the moon. If squirrel variants did shift colors from black to orange in the course of their development, phase could be applied as a descriptor. However, they do not. I add this because I see the word phase so commonly misapplied :-)

Fox Squirrel

Eastern Fox Squirrel, Sciurus niger, Lorain County, Ohio.

Now this is a darn good looking squirrel. I had the good fortune to have one of these orange-colored beauties race right across my path the other day, and then offer himself up for photo ops.

Fox Squirrels are in acorn heaven this fall. With the massive mast crop, they are racing hither and yon, gorging themselves on nuts and fattening to elephantine proportions. They're big to start with. A whopper can easily tip the scales to a kilo! That's right - over two pounds!

Sometimes dubbed "stump-eared squirrels", Fox Squirrels are the largest of the tree squirrels in North America and dwarf our other, somewhat similar species, the Eastern Gray Squirrel, S. carolinensis, of which a large one might weigh a bit more than half of what a fox does.

Fox Squirrels prefer open landscapes with scattered trees and woodlots, while the Grays favor denser more contiguous woodlands. They've undoubtedly become far more common in Ohio following settlement of the state, and the subsequent clearing of the formerly unbroken and expansive eastern deciduous forest.

This particular unit was busily running about, seizing red oak acorns that had fallen. Those nuts that he didn't gobble on the spot would be likely be transported to a stache somewhere and concealed. These frenetic beasts forget where they've hidden many of the nuts, thus aiding in tree dispersal.

Perhaps the most spectacular feature of an Eastern Fox Squirrel is the tail. A magnificent appendage, it uses the proportionately massive, brushlike tail to signal its moods, much like a Norwegian Forest Cat does. In the pin-the-tail-on-the donkey shot above, the squirrel is seemingly happily pawing a nut from the grass and preparing for a luxurious treat.

I snapped this image as another, more Alpha squirrel quickly approached, and our squirrel is starting to express displeasure by rapidly flicking its tail, like a flag snapping in a hurricane. Seconds later the interloper was hot on this one's heels, resulting in a mad Keystone Kops style high speed chase throughout the park.

Even though the purpose of this trip was birds, I'll always take pause to admire this most handsome of squirrels, and chuckle at their wacky antics.