Black Squirrels

Posted on February 11, 2008 with No Comments

You are not seeing things. There is infact a black squirrel.

“For decades the black squirrel has been a fixture in parts of the Bronx and Manhattan’s Central Park. Capt. Richard Simon of the New York City Parks Department said.

Black squirrels have also colonized suburban Washington D.C.; Reedsburg, Wis., and Princeton, N.J. But until recently they had not made their presence known on Long Island

The black squirrel is the same species as the gray squirrel, which has a white belly and big bushy tail. Their dark, almost silky color stems from a genetic variation called melanism.
“The only population that I am aware of [on Long Island] is in Lake Grove,” said Tim Green, a zoologist and chairman of the Foundation for Ecological Research in the Northeast (FERN), a non-profit organization.

Green’s group has provided a $3,000 grant to Michele Miller and April Mindlin, fifth-grade teachers at the Eugene Auer Memorial Elementary School in Lake Grove, whose students are combining scientific methods and high-tech gadgets to study the area’s black squirrel population.

These pint-size biologists go out in the field and collect data: counting the black and gray squirrels they see, along with their nests, and taking soil and air temperature readings. ”

Is this squirrel evolution? They certainly do look different from the normal gray bushy tailed squirrels we see outside our kitchen windows. As cute as they are it is still a rodent.

It is nice to see that there are those willing to research things that are new and different. What is even nicer is that they have include our school aged children. Not every child has an interest in learning about new things and with programs such as these perhaps we can engage those who normally wouldn’t show an interest.

To read more of this article go to http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2008/02/10/2008-02-10_black_squirrels_on_long_island.html