LITTLE FOLKS THAT GNAW 197 



a part of his normal and ceaseless activities in 

 securing or storing food. 



Much of this food, especially in the woods, is 

 not stored in any of his holes (for the woodland 

 red squirrel almost always has at least two holes, 

 one on the ground under a root or stump, one up a 

 tree — and he may have a twig nest besides). He 

 will collect nuts, pine and hemlock cones, seeds, 

 and the like, in many places, sometimes merely 

 cacheing the collection under a few needles on the 

 ground. One of the most remarkable traits is his 

 unerring instinct, a month, two months, even five 

 months later, for finding these stores through two 

 feet or more of snow. Again and again in the woods 

 I have seen squirrel tracks on the snow, with no 

 sign of digging, and then, suddenly, a hole right 

 down to the ground. Near by will be the signs 

 of his feeding around some stump, where he 

 has sat to shred his cone for the toothsome seeds. 

 I do not think that a red squirrel ranges very far — 

 relatively, that is. He comes to know every foot 

 of ground and, what is even more important, every 

 foot of branch and trunk and twig in his section of 

 woods, and he has an excellent memory. He knows, 

 for instance, just what slender lateral branch will lead 

 him to a safe leap into the next tree, and the quickest 

 aerial route to a hole. He has regular arboreal high- 

 ways and cross-alleys, and it takes a lively hawk to 

 catch him. He is strong, active, intelligent, some- 

 what unscrupulous, but tireless in industry, and he 

 takes thought for the morrow. That is sufficient to 

 explain his universal survival while his less active and 

 provident gray cousin has diminished in numbers. 



