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In Norse mythology, the squirrel Ratatoskr is a messenger who scurries up and down the trunk of the world-tree Yggdrasil, carrying malicious gossip and insults back and forth between the dragon Níðhöggr, who sits at the bottom of the tree gnawing on its roots, and the hawk Veðrfölnir, who sits at the top of the tree keeping watch.
The eastern gray squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis), also known, particularly outside of North America, as simply the grey squirrel, is a tree squirrel in the genus Sciurus.It is native to eastern North America, where it is the most prodigious and ecologically essential natural forest regenerator.
The western gray squirrel (Sciurus griseus) is a tree squirrel found along the western coast of the United States and Mexico. In some places, this species has also been known as the silver-gray squirrel , the California gray squirrel , the Oregon gray squirrel , the Columbian gray squirrel and the banner-tail .
Squirrels are generally small animals, ranging in size from the African pygmy squirrel and least pygmy squirrel at 10–14 cm (3.9–5.5 in) in total length and just 12–26 g (0.42–0.92 oz) in weight, [8] [9] to the Bhutan giant flying squirrel at up to 1.27 m (4 ft 2 in) in total length, [10] and several marmot species, which can weigh 8 kg ...
Approximately twice the size of a gray squirrel, the southern fox squirrel is considered to be the most variably colored tree squirrel in the world.
The currently accepted scientific name for Abert's squirrel is Sciurus aberti Woodhouse, 1853. [4] Woodhouse had initially described the species as Sciurus dorsalis in 1852, but this name turned out to be preoccupied by Sciurus dorsalis Gray, 1849 (now a subspecies of variegated squirrel S. variegatoides), and thus the present species was renamed.
Squirrels eat a variety of nuts, berries, fruit, conifer tree cones, greens, and fungi. ©Dmitry Potashkin/iStock via Getty Images Squirrels are masters at storage and also deception.
The species is the largest tree squirrel in the state. It’s being threatened by climate change, habitat loss and frequent disease outbreaks. Gray squirrel may become endangered species in WA.