Latest Squirrels Stories
By Jeremy LovellLONDON (Reuters) - Britain's native red squirrels, already in headlong retreat, are being wiped out not just by competition for resources with non-indigenous gray squirrels but from a virus the grays carry, research showed on Monday.The squirrel poxvirus is harmless to the grays but kills reds within two weeks of contact, said the researchers from Newcastle University and Queen Mary, University of London among others.In the absence of a vaccine, they proposed killing gray...
Latest Squirrels Reference Libraries
The Cape ground squirrel (Xerus inauris) is native to southern areas of Africa. Its range includes South Africa, Botswana, and Namibia, although it does not occur in coastal areas of this region. In Botswana, it occurs in southwestern Kalahari, and in South Africa, it occurs in south and south central areas. The name of the Cape ground squirrel is misleading, as its range is much larger than the name suggests. It is thought that the name was used in order to distinguish the species from the...
Smith’s bush squirrel (Paraxerus cepapi) is native to many areas of Africa including Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Namibia, and Zambia, among other regions. Its other common names include the Yellow-footed Squirrel and the South African name of Tree Squirrel. Smith’s bush squirrel is approximately 1.1 feet in length, including the tail, which can comprise up to half the body length. It is small, weighing only seven ounces. The fur color of this squirrel varies in...
The Indian Giant Squirrel, Ratufa indica, is a large forest squirrel found in South Asia. It is sometimes called the Malabar Squirrel in India. It is distributed in tropical forest along the Western Ghats, central and north eastern India and Nepal. Adult squirrels grow to about 3.3 feet long and weigh around 4.4 pounds. Its coat can be off-white, red, or almost black, though some colour variations seem to be disappearing. Indian Giant Squirrels rarely leave the treetops. They travel from...
