American red squirrels, also known as pine squirrels, are easing out of their grayish winter coats and slipping into their reddish summer jackets here. They soon will be mostly red with dark stripes along their sides, sort of the rodent version of racing stripes.
This one also has something going on near the shoulders. I wonder if those patches might be a case of mange from mites, which I’m told is not unusual in red and gray squirrels.
Nonetheless, this little fellow seemed chipper and normally nasty when cursing me out Saturday. Red squirrels (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus Erxleben) are one of our most unsociable, aggressive, and territorial mammals, notwithstanding their size. They usually don’t even tolerate their own mate or any other squirrel species in their territories, except when breeding.
Some of them will take food handouts from humans when they invade human territory, but when we invade their territory, most get angry and sputter, growl, and deliver curses in squirrelese. (Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on May 4, 2024.)