The Gray Squirrel 137 



severe they are abroad during the winter. However, 

 the gray squirrel, in common with most of our other 

 squirrels, has the habit of digging holes and hiding 

 a nut or two here and there. It has been argued that 

 this is an idle pastime, and that nuts so concealed in 

 many places could never again be located by the 

 squirrel, but it must be remembered that the sense of 

 smell in the squirrel is very acute, probably guiding 

 the animal far more than memory. It must be this 

 wonderful sense of smell that directs the squirrel 

 where to dig in the snow, securing from beneath the 

 leaves the nuts that were buried weeks before; or 

 that guides him to a solitary nut tree or to the grain 

 in a barn. 



This stored food constitutes only a part of the 

 gray squirrel's winter supply. The other part he must 

 scurry about to find. The beech trees and some 

 others do not drop all of their nuts at the approach 

 of winter. There still hang a few solitary nuts on 

 each tree, and through a large beech forest the number 

 so left is considerable. But the gray squirrel is not 

 the only claimant for the nuts : the red squirrels and 

 the red headed woodpeckers demanding for themselves 

 the lion's share. The birds seem to think that these 

 nuts are exclusively their property, and vigorously do 

 they protest if a squirrel appears. One determined 



