516 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 192 8 



ENEMIES 



The chief enemy of this species in the northern woods is the pine 

 marten, whose climbing ability and agility in the trees equals that of 

 the squirrel. Both in the north and further south, weasels and hawks 

 and owls are the red squirrels' enemies. Fisher (1893) lists the gos- 

 hawk, Cooper's hawk, red-tailed hawk, red-shouldered hawk, broad- 

 winged haAvk, and barred owl as including this species among their 

 food. 



RELATION TO GRAY SQUIRRELS 



Wherever the red and the gray (or black) squirrel inhabit the same 

 territory the red always chases the gray and the latter runs without 

 putting up a fight, though it is nearly twice the size of its fiery pur- 

 suer. A report which has wide currency among trappers and hunters 

 is that the red squirrel castrates the gray. Seton says that this is 

 '' an ancient, picturesque, and sanguinary myth," and I was of the 

 same opinion until I was told by Prof. Manley Baker that he had 

 actually seen a red squirrel seize the scrotum of a gray squirrel, and 

 tear it open, on at least a dozen different occasions. He did not think 

 that the act was the result of a deliberate attack for that purpose, 

 but that the red squirrel seized and hung onto the most posterior part, 

 aside from the tail, of the fleeing gray squirrel's anatomy. Professor 

 Baker also stated that he had shot more than 40 gray squirrels which 

 had been castrated. 



RELATION TO BIRDS 



There is plenty of data in ornithological and mammalogical litera- 

 ture to prove that the eggs and young of many species of birds arc 

 destroyed by red squirrels. Merriam (1884) says: "I have myself 

 known him to rob the nests of the red-eyed vireo, chipping sparrow, 

 robin, Wilson's thrush, and ruffed grouse, and doubt not that thou- 

 sands of eggs are annually sacrificed, in the Adirondack region alone, 

 to gratify this appetite." Mearns (1878) says that the red squirrel 

 is the worst enemy of the robin, and many other writers cite cases of 

 depredations on robins' nests. Seton mentions a case of a red squirrel 

 eating a young flicker. B. S. Bowdish, in a letter which was the only 

 response I received to a note in the Journal of Mammalogy asking for 

 first-hand information on the destruction of young birds or bird's eggs 

 by red squirrels, says : 



I had, about 15 years ago, an experience in personally seeing a red squirrel 

 enter a bird house on a pole, bring out a third-grown young bluebird, and sitting 

 on the roof of the house, open the bird's skull and devour the brains, throwing 

 the body to the ground and repeating until the family of young bluebirds had all 

 been destroyed. I have watched a nuthatch building a nest in a cavity, and a 

 week or so later, found the same cavity occupied by a squirrel's nest with the 

 intruder in possession thereof. 



