RODENTIA 257 



Bailey has published notes on the squirrels of Texas, from which 

 we have briefed the following items: 8 Where they occur, acorns seem 

 to be their favorite food, but they must be content with the food that 

 is available where they happen to be living. The food habits of closely 

 related species and subspecies elsewhere would probably be very simi- 

 lar if the same foods were available. Large-spotted ground squirrel 

 (Citelhis spilosoma major): "I have found their stomachs full of 

 grasshoppers and beetles and their pouches full of seeds of sand bur 

 (Cenchrus tribuloides) , and have seen little heaps of the empty bur 

 shells scattered about their burrows. Usually they are not sufficiently 

 numerous in agricultural regions to do serious damage in grain fields." 

 Black-backed rock squirrel (Otospermophihis grammurus buckleyi): 

 when available, acorns are its chief diet, but in summer mainly flowers, 

 fruit and green vegetables. One stomach contained green cactus fruit 

 (Opuntia). Another was filled with yucca pulp. One had stonecrop 

 in its cheeks and another had its cheeks stuffed with green corn. Couch 

 rock squirrel (0. g. couchii) : food largely juniper berries and acorns; 

 some found feeding on clover and other plants and fruits of cactus. 

 Rock squirrel (0. g. grammurus): feeds upon juniper berries and 

 acorns, but also takes cactus fruit, Cereus stramineus and walnuts. 

 One had 13 walnuts the size of cherries in its cheeks and cactus fruits 

 in its stomach. Rio Grande ground squirrels (Citelhis mexicanus par- 

 widens) : "feed on seeds, grain, fruit, green foliage, lizards and nu- 

 merous insects ... do considerable damage in spring, by digging up 

 corn, melons, beans and various sprouting seeds, and, in summer and 

 fall, by feeding on the ripening grain. Specimens examined at Ros- 

 well, New Mexico, in June, were feeding on about equal proportions 

 of seeds and insects." Pale striped ground squirrel (C. tridecemlinea- 

 tus pallidus) : August specimens examined contained mainly grass- 

 hoppers, with a few other insects, and one contained prickly pear seeds 

 (Opuntia). Texas striped ground squirrels (C. t. texensis): "feed 

 largely on grasshoppers and other insects, together with seeds, grain, 

 fruit, green herbage and flowers." Texas antelope squirrel (Ammos- 

 permophilus leucurus interpres) : feeds on various seeds and fruits, es- 

 pecially acacia and mesquite. One stomach was full of cactus fruits, 

 which had tinted its flesh purple throughout, indicating a steady diet 

 for some time. Gray-footed chipmunk (Eutamias cinereicollis canipes) : 

 food chiefly scrub oak acorns. Western fox squirrel (Sciurus niger rufi- 



8 Bailey, Biological survey of Texas, N. Amer. Fauna, No. 25, 1905. 



