General Chat

Just been onto the BBC website and there's a video clip of black squirrels! never seen them before and they're very unusual looking but beautiful!

Carole

My mum was telling me about them yesterday. Apparently they are hybrids of inbred grey squirrels. Some of them are black and brown.

Yes, they were saying that on the news clip. Unfortunately they didn't have footage of the black/brown ones but the jet black ones are beautiful

carole x

i seen a white one on the news the other week was very cute


luv
stray
xxx

We saw lots of them when we lived near Letchworth. Apparently the males have a lot more testosterone than the greys so will be more aggressive and could quite likely take over from them. this also means that the red squirrel will be even more at risk.

Ann
Glos

Talk about aggressive squirrels have a look at this!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4489792.stm

***worries***

They are beautiful. I think it's time black & grey (and variations of ) squirrel fur coats came into fashion!!!
Poor old red squirrels don't stand a chance!!!

maggie

Will you PLEASE stop saying that......I'll be going into hibernation early lol

I live in Letchworth Garden City that is famous for them. A local pub was called The Black Squirrel.

Black squirrels are smaller than grey squirrels and are really quite timid compared to the aggressive greys.

I think they were first spotted many many years ago on Norton Common in Letchworth. Since then they have moved out into surrounding areas and in the 1970's had reached Stevenage Old Town. I remember seeing them in the grounds of the new Lister Hospital.

In the 1980's Terry Wogan had a long running saga on his Radio Two programme about black squirrels in Letchworth.

I tend to take them for granted as they are seen so frequently here. They are great acrobats and a joy to watch.

Viv

Sorry Squirrel - but I AM on your side LOL

Unusual?!?

They're all we have in Ontario now!

When I was a kid, Victoria Park, the big central park in London, Ontario, where I grew up, was full of red squirrels. They're all gone now.

I have loads of black squirrels around the house now, in the urban core of a big city, and they are indeed aggressive -- and entertaining. For three or four years, I had "Rat Ear", who spent half his life in my house. He knew where the peanuts were. I'd be sitting in the dining room working, and there would come Rat Ear down the staircase from the second floor, where he came in the bathroom window. He'd sit and stare at me til he got peanuts, or rip the house apart looking for them, and I swear he tried to bury one in the VCR one time.

Rat Ear got in bad shape one fall -- missing great chunks of fur. I happened to read about a newfangled disease called squirrel pox that had recently shown up in my area, and danged if he didn't look like he had it, even though there'd only been 7 cases identified locally.

Feeling like I had Munchausen's syndrome by squirrel, I called the wildlife centre, and they said he undoubtedly just had mange, but with that much fur missing he wouldn't last the winter. So I finally trapped him, and took him in -- and danged if he didn't get diagnosed with squirrel pox. They kept him six weeks and gave him back to me.

We get a couple of grey squirrels now and then -- quite gorgeous -- and yup, the blacks do their best to chase them off.

So enjoy whatever other squirrels while you can. If you have black squirrels now, that's all you'll have before long!

I thought the greys were bad! They'd better look after us reds, we're a protected species as it is,