The coat colour of red squirrels may vary from bright ginger/light red through to red and dark brown, or black tinged with blue-grey in winter.  Although often the colouring is the same (uniform) throughout the body, except for a white or cream belly/underside.

Breeding behaviour:

Breeding can begin in mid-winter (December/January) and continue through the summer (ie August/September), depending on the weather and how much food is available. Delay or absence of breeding may occur when supplies of seed foods are poor.

Females have one or two litters a year.  Squirrel pregnancy last for 38-39 days.  The litter size can vary from 4 to 7 young, with often only 2 to 3 young being born to younger females.  There can be one or two litters per year with the two peaks of births often occurring in February to April and then again in May to August.  Young or yearling females often only have a single litter per year.

Juveniles leave the nest at about 7 weeks of age, but are not fully weaned until around 10 weeks and do not breed until they are one year old.

Nests:

Squirrel nests, or dreys, are constructed of twigs in a tree fork, or hollow or above a whorl of branches close to the stem of a conifer, often approximately 6m up or higher. They are lined with soft hair, moss and dried grass.  Occasionally hollow trees may be used for nest sites, particularly in broad-leaved woodland.  Several squirrels may share the same drey, or use the same drey on different days.

Habitat and range:

Red squirrels live in all types of woodland habitats from pure broadleaf, to mixed broadleaf and conifer, to pure conifer and are also often spotted in parks and gardens.  Squirrels are very dependant on a constant and adequate supply of seeds, hence mixed tree-species rather than single tree species forests often provide a more reliable year-round food supply.

Natural Diet:

Their main foods are tree seeds, such as hazel nuts, acorns, beechnuts, chestnuts and seeds from conifer cones. They also eat tree flowers and shoots, berries and other fruit, mushrooms and fungi from under tree bark. Red squirrels often suffer periods of food shortage especially during July.

Red squirrels spend about three-quarters of their active time above ground in trees and shrubs.  They are opportunistic foragers, with foraging and feeding taking up about 60-80% of their active time.  Squirrels may strip bark off conifer trees to reach the sap and will gnaw the scales off pinecones to reach the seeds.  Squirrels do hoard and store food.  Foods such as hazelnuts, beechnuts, acorns and conifer cones can be scatter-hoarded, just under the soil surface, and often one to four items will be found per store.

Social behaviour and activity patterns:

Squirrels are generally solitary animals, but can share dreys (nests), especially in the winter or spring months.  The size of home ranges can vary for each individual squirrel and they may even overlap with other squirrels, especially where food is abundant.  Males also often have larger home ranges than females.

Squirrels are very good jumpers and climbers and are extremely agile when travelling along tree branches.  However, squirrels do come to the ground when foraging or when burying food.  They are diurnal (active in the daytime), though in summer they may rest for an hour or two around mid-day.  The times during which squirrels are most active are early morning (2-4 hours after sunrise) and late afternoon (2-4 hours before sunset) in summer and in the winter, they are mainly active in the late morning. 

Squirrels do not hibernate, but if the weather is very stormy or cold, they may stay in their nests for several days on winter.

Conservation:

The Red Squirrel is the only squirrel that is native to Britain and their populations are considered vulnerable, as the distribution of Red Squirrels has been seen to decline drastically over the last 60 years.  However, in Jersey, the Red Squirrels are thriving, especially as there are no Grey Squirrels on the Island; Grey Squirrels can act in competition against the Red Squirrels for habitat and food, but more importantly, the Grey Squirrels can carry a Pox virus without any clinical signs, but the Red Squirrels are very susceptible to infection by this pox virus which often results in their death. 

Red squirrels are protected by law, and may not be intentionally trapped, killed or kept.