
Fox Squitrt, 
woods live very much as the gray squirrels do in summer, but 
are generally less provident in the matter of preparing for the 
cold season, preferring rather to avoid those regions where the 
snow lies deep for any length of time and depending for food 
on whatever they may find from day to day, scratching among 
fallen leaves for acorns and nuts, and when these fail, living on 
the buds of trees as best they may. 
In rough weather they keep close at home in their hollow 
trees, choosing to go hungry rather than face the cold. In warm 
weather they gather wild fruit, berries and mushrooms and go 
into the corn fields as soon as the ears have reached the milky 
stage. Among the southern pines they make large nests of Span- 
ish moss in the tree-tops, and here they bring the cones which 
they cut off, just as the red squirrels do the cones of the white 
pines in the North, biting off the scales in order to get at the 
seeds in a similar manner. The scales scattered about the foot 
of their tree often betray them to the squirrel-hunter. 
A full-grown fox squirrel, owing to his size and _ strength, 
has probably little to fear from hawks, though a red-tailed hawk 
might not fear to attack one on occasion, or a goshawk when 
driven south by an unusually hard winter. The fox squirrels’ 
worst enemies are undoubtedly the wild cat, gray fox and raccoon. 
In hardwoods fox squirrels build nests of dry leaves, a large 
bunch frequently conspicuously bright yellow; the entrance to a 
warmly lined nest of broken up leaves is a small hole in the side. 
At other times they live in holes in trees, using dry grass and 
strips of soft bark for a lining. 
They are much hunted as an article of food, being well 
flavoured and heavy, but it requires skilful watching to kill many 
of them. 
In Florida the ‘‘crackers’’ look for scattered chips of the pine 
cones at the foot of each tree and, finding them recently dropped, 
hide near-by and wait patiently for hours to get a shot. 
Varieties of the Fox Squirrel 
1. Northern Fox Squirrel. Scturus rufiventer neglectus (Gray). 
Description and range as above. 
2. Western Fox Squirrel. S. rufiventer Geoffroy. Similar, but 
generally partially black, sometimes all black above and 
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