bouncy things

[whispercricket]

The squirrels are out in force today - it must be the sun, because I think the temperature's still below freezing. One bounced blithely across the street in front of my car, and I cheered that it would make it all the way across before anyone else came along (it did :) ).

Squirrels here still seem weird to me - they're more like squirmonks than true squirrels. Squirrels where I grew up are much larger, fatter (although that's possibly because my mother feeds them), and lighter brown in color. Squirrels here are darker, smaller, and proportionally perkier. Anyway, they're all cute.

Comments

[frozencapybara.livejournal.com]

OK, I really like the word "squirmonk."

Where did you grow up? I can't remember seeing any particuarly different squirrels (other than the whole gray/red squirrel difference) in my travels - except, of course, for Austria, where they have freaky goth squirrels.

[whispercricket]

I grew up in Ann Arbor, MI. You made me curious, so I did a bit of poking around, and I think the squirrels back there are fox squirrels, which oddly are found throughout the eastern US except in New England (I'm guessing it's weather related)., I think the ones I see a lot around here are eastern grey squirrels, although there are others that are supposed to live in New England.

Freaky goth squirrels? :) What do you mean (maybe a picture)?

[frozencapybara.livejournal.com]

The freaky goth squirrels were black (hence, goth), and had cute little tufted ears. They were, despite being generally squirrel-shaped, completely different from any other squirrels I've seen. They were kind of scary, but cute.

[meranthi.livejournal.com]

Oh, we have squirrels like that at home. Smaller than any of the others and black, they chase off anything that might get near "their" territory. Well, except humans. But this includes other larger squirrels, chipmonks, birds, cats...

[frozencapybara.livejournal.com]

Looking at the squirrel index - I think the freaky goth squirrels were Abert squirrels, or at least the European equivalent thereof. And yes, they live in colorado. Info and picture here.

[meranthi.livejournal.com]

I think they're cute, but Also know as the most handsome rodent in all of North America??? Though, we don't have capybaras...