Pennsylvania Game News - March 2018 - 63

the United States and England, that it's
difficult to distinguish those that occur
naturally.
In Britain, black gray squirrels were
released at the end of the 19th century.
In the U.S., 18 black gray squirrels from
Canada arrived at the National Zoo during
Teddy Roosevelt's presidency. Canada
also sent 10 to Kent, Ohio in 1961.
Strangest of all is the so-called "Home
of the Black Squirrels" out in the plains in
Marysville, Kansas.
Supposedly these squirrels escaped
from a traveling circus, or maybe a gypsy
encampment, in the late 1920s. Marysville even holds an annual Black Squirrel
Celebration.
The black squirrels in Washington,
D.C. have spread over the city, and they've
done the same in other towns and cities
where they were released.
Apparently, they are safer from their
predators - primarily birds of prey.
And squirrel hunters eager to bag a
black squirrel cannot shoot them in such
places.
I checked a couple online sources and
found black gray squirrels live in the Philadelphia area, in Fairmount Park within
the city and on the Haverford College
campus, which has so many of them the
name Black Squirrels has been adopted
by the college's sports teams.
Black squirrels also are found in the
eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh.
A.D. Plummer, who says he hunts and
fishes every day in central Pennsylvania,
according to the Answers section of the
Field and Stream website, claimed he'd
never seen a black squirrel in the region
until 2009, when he saw two in two
places, 30 miles apart.
This provoked several more comments.
MARCH 2018

S. Testy, who lives in Enola, Cumberland
County, wrote in 2009, "There's a pack of
black squirrels that live on Valley Road
and North Enola Drive ... I've seen several out at one time."
M.J. Frazier in 2012 reported from
western Pennsylvania about a small,
neighborhood colony that liked birdseed,
but stayed away from gray squirrels.
"The squirrels are solid black and
look very kinetic as they move about,"
Frazier reported. "They will not come to
the feeder close to the house, but one in
the yard about 30 yards away which is
stocked with black oil sunflower seeds."
Rudy Glove, writing in 2015, added
"Black squirrels everywhere now."
Well, not quite everywhere.
On the HuntingPA.com website, in answer to a hunter's question about where he
can find black squirrels, it looks as if the
largest numbers still live in the wild across
the northern tier of the commonwealth.
One hunter found black squirrels scattered in five locations over four counties
- Lycoming, Clinton, Potter and Tioga.
Another reported three blacks to one
gray in Cook Forest, Clarion County, adding that one day he counted five different
black squirrels.
Several were seen near Dubois in
Clearfield County and a couple hunters
claimed they were common near Kinzua
Dam in the Allegheny National Forest.
Two hunters mentioned Pike County in
northeastern Pennsylvania, and another
Brookville in Jefferson County, near Treasure Lake.
Whether all these squirrels were coal
black, brown-black, or both is not clear
except for those reported by M.J. Frazier.
But S. Testy did question articles that say
only one gray squirrel in 10,000 is black,
saying he suspects - at least here in Pennsylvania - such an estimate is low.
63
http://www.HuntingPA.com
Pennsylvania Game News - March 2018

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