166 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Order: RODENTIA. 



Family: Sciurid^.. — (Squirrel Family.) 



Characteristics. — Molars, ten in the upper and eight in the lower jaw, 



or eight in tlie upper and lower jaws, rooted or rootless. No ante-orbital 



foramen in the anterior root of the zygoma, or else small and rounded. 



Tibia and fibula distinct. (Baird.) 



Genus : Sciurus. — (Linn.) 



This genus includes the true arboreal squirrels. Some of its features 

 are common to other genera in the family sciuridce, but the following 

 constitute peculiar characteristics : Head moderately small ; ears small, 

 erect ; eyes large ; snout and upper lip divided ; incisors, two in each 

 jaw, the upper, wedge or chisel-shaped at the extremity, the lower ones 

 compressed laterally ; molars tubercular, ten in the upper and eight in 

 the lower jaw ; body elongated ; limbs strong ; fore-feet with five toes 

 and a tubercle, instead of a thumb ; hind feet with five long toes, all 

 furnished with long, hooked claws ; tail nearly as long or quite as long 

 in some cases longer than the body, with long bushy hair arranged 

 on its sides, directed laterally ; teats, eight in number, two pectoral and 

 six ventral. 



Sciurus Carolmensis, (Gmelin.) — Gray Squirrel. 



This beautiful animal is still common in this State. It is one of the 

 most beautiful and graceful of the inhabitants of our forests, in which it 

 generally makes its home, hardly ever venturing from them, unless occa- 

 sionally, Avhen the Indian corn is ripe, it enters the fields to add a little 

 to its winter store of nuts ; the amount which it pilfers could hardly be 

 missed, however, unless the field should happen to be in or near the 

 woods. 



It prefers forests of chestnuts or oaks, in which its winter store can be 

 readily collected. The first heavy frost is the signal for this work to 

 commence, and the dropping of the chestnuts and acorns which the frost has 

 loosened, accompanied by the rustling of the squirrel through the newly- 

 fallen leaves as it gathers the nuts together, and carefully deposits them 

 in hollow trees and crevices of rocks, or buries them in some secure place 

 beneath the leaves, are the sounds most intimately connected with our 

 woods in the autumn season. 



The gray squirrel is often hunted, both for food and for its fur ; its 

 activity, the rapidity with which it scampers up and down the trees, and 

 leaps from one tree-top to another, and the cunning with which it hides 

 from the gunner, dodging to the opposite side of the tree from him, 

 rendering the sport highly exciting. 



The summer nest is built in some tall tree, at the junction of several 

 limbs with the trunk. It is composed of sticks and leaves, and is lined 



