A Black Gray or I Never Thought I'd See 1 of These in Our Area

[Gerard KlugParticipant]

Sat. 9/16, my backyard: I had just parked my car in the garage. It was about noon. Upon opening the door to my backy., I was greeted by a strange, scratchy chattering not quite like any animal sounds I’ve heard in my neighborhood. I looked up into the young mulberry tree betw. my house and the neighbors and looking back at me was what I at 1st took to be a Fox Squirrel in shadow.

Fox Squ.’s are the most familiar mammal in my neighborhood and quite abundant. I’m long acquainted with their sounds and have never seen any unusual pelages. So why did this 1 look and sound so different?

I went upstairs and outside to our flat parapet style roof, putting me only about 15 ft. and at eye level with it. I was astonished to come face to face with an animal I never thought I’d see in the Toledo area — a Gray Squirrel.

It chattered again and hopped from the mulberry to the intermingling walnut tree branches on the other side of the roof. It was sooty black with lighter colored eyelids like a broken eye ring and had short hair tufts growing from the tops of its ears. It was slightly smaller and proportioned slightly different than a Fox.

When it started head 1st down the walnut trunk, I ran inside to get my brother to see if he could get it on his cell phone. When we were both back outside, it was on the fence of the neighbor on the other side. We were then able to compare it directly to a couple of Fox Squ.s. Their presence seemed to make it a little more nervous.

It meandered its way east from the fence to a Silver Maple in the next yard. Then it scampered onto the back porch of that same yard. We last saw it in a Chinese or Siberian Elm in the yard beyond the last 1. This all took about 25 min.’s.

Does this need to be documented like a rare bird? Does something such as the ODNR need to be informed?

I have been given much confusing and contradictory info. about this species range. Some say they’re in Bowling Green. I went down there and drove around town for hours and only saw 1 squirrel — a Fox. Others told me they’re in Port Clinton, but I never saw any there. Still others said they’re at Wernerts Corners on Tremainsville. I belonged to a club that used to meet there, but no soap.

I’ve been told they are in Detroit and I’ve also been told there’s only Foxes there. I can’t recall seeing any Grays in the Motor City. Some mammal books maintain if you go across the lake to Canada, there are only Grays. But others have it that there are Fox Squ.’s on Pelee I. and just across the Detroit narrows in Windsor.

The only places I’ve seen Grays are in the twin cities area, Niagra Falls, places in Ont. far from here, and in Quebec. I never found any in north central IN where my mother’s people were from. I’m thoroughly confused as to where the nearest 1s to this area are.

Primevally, some say all the squirrels here were Grays. I have my doubts. Where did all the Grays go and where did all the Foxes come from? Grays live in scads of human-altered places across the continent. So why would they have disappeared from here?

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