128 ANIMAL COMPETITORS 
rain, and a hollow tree is sought and furnished 
with clean bedding of moss, lichens, etc. Here 
the young are born rather early in the season, 
—five or six of them,—and there they remain 
together until fully grown. 
“‘The young squirrels,’’ to quote again Mr. Cram’s 
delightful history, ‘‘are most absurd looking little 
beasts at first, like miniature pug-dogs, blind and 
naked, with enormous heads. In a few days their 
fur begins to show like the down on a peach, and as a 
fringe of short hair along each side of the tail, which 
at length assumes something of the flattened aspect 
of that worn by their elders, but without displaying 
much of the fluffy, shadowy quality of the ideal squir- 
rel tail-until late in the following autumn. : 
Although they do not remain long in the nest, they. 
are seldom seen abroad until fully grown, or very 
nearly so, at least, which is rather remarkable when 
you come to consider the number that are brought 
up each summer in every pine grove or thicket where 
these squirrels are abundant. . . .’’ 
How a red squirrel fares. The red squir- 
rel eats almost anything he can lay his teeth 
to, but his chief diet, of course, consists of 
berries, nuts, acorns and similar hard fruits, 
especially the seeds found in the cones of ever- 
green trees—the mainstay of those living in 
