THE BRITISH OR LIGHT-TAILED SQUIRREL 707 



sometimes becomes very familiar, and soon learns to enter by 

 the windows to secure an accustomed meal. Even perfectly 

 wild Squirrels have been known to climb or enter a house, 

 either to escape danger, to rob a sparrow's nest of the young 

 birds, or even, in hard weather, to steal bread. 



Its food is very varied, and includes almost every vegetable 

 substance from which nourishment can be extracted. In text- 

 books the nuts of the hazel usually appear first in its dietary ; 

 but, if the truth be told, they are probably eaten much more 

 rarely than are many other more easily obtainable substances, 

 such as leaf-buds and tender shoots, young bark, acorns, beech- 

 mast, seeds of sycamore, fir-cones and haws, all of which are 

 included in every comprehensive list. It also feeds largely on 

 fungi (agarics, etc.) in the autumn (W. Evans). Mr O. V. Aplin ^ 

 has described the actions of a pair of Squirrels as they gathered 

 beech-mast and carried it away to their winter retreat in some 

 thick firs. He says : — " As the mast grows at the extreme 

 outside of the trees, and only at the end of the slender drooping 

 twigs, and usually out of (Squirrel) reach of any of the thicker 

 branches, I imagined they had to content themselves with 

 any of the fallen nuts. But I found that they ventured boldly 

 out into the small twigs, and, hanging on by their hind legs, 

 drew the mast to them by their forepaws and bit it off, when, 

 with the exercise of the greatest agility, they twisted round, 

 and with a quick jump regained the stronger branches. Of 

 course, a good deal of the mast fell to the ground, and Squirrels 

 seemed occasionally to get quite out of temper with a refractory 

 twig which refused to come to hand ; when this happened, the 

 angry impatient snatches made by the little animals were quite 

 amusing. No doubt they felt their position precarious, for the 

 breaking of a twig or the slip of a claw meant a clear twenty- 

 foot drop, with nothing to catch at : no great matter, of course, 

 to a Squirrel when it throws itself off a bough to drop, 

 parachute-like, to the ground, but quite another thing when 

 taken as an unexpected fall." 



Whenever opportunity offers, it leaves the woods in search 

 of fruit, pilfering plums, Spanish chestnuts, cherries, apricots, 

 peaches, strawberries, pears, and bilberries. As a rule it eats 



1 Zoologist, 1885, 478. 



