Austin is home to many (some say too many!) Eastern Fox Squirrels, Sciurus niger. These natives are both charming and annoying, adding comedic energy to the garden; there’s never a dull moment with these fuzzy-tailed characters. While some (occasionally including yours truly) find these cute critters irritating, squirrels play an important role in the dissemination of native plants by their consumption of seeds and disposal afterwards. In short, squirrels plant a lot of trees.
Recently, I looked out my kitchen window and saw a Rock Squirrel, Otospermophilus variegatus, nosing around in the garden, which was quite a surprise. I know Rock Squirrels are native in parts of Texas, but I’ve never seen one in my garden or anywhere else in Austin.
Austin (Travis County) lies at the eastern edge of these squirrels’ range; they’re more common in the Hill Country areas. Apparently, Rock Squirrels here in Central Texas tend to be brownish in coloring, though those further west are black to grey. This fella is definitely a westerner and I wonder if he’s a sub-species, Otospermophilus v. buckleyi. He’s quite a handsome fella, too–look at that fluffy tail! He’s also a little bigger than my pet-like Fox Squirrels.
True to what I read about Rock Squirrels, he helped himself to some greens, in this case, the leaves, stems (and seeds?) of a Yellow Columbine. Rocky also likes to munch on other seeds and foliage, as well as insects.
After his snack, a nice, cool drink of water finished his meal.
I moved on to other adventures that day and never saw Rocky again. I hope he returns; it would be interesting, maybe fun, and no doubt exasperating to host two squirrel species in the garden.
I suppose I should be careful what I wish for, after all, they are squirrels!
My Gardener Says... 
I’ve heard of variegated plants, but this is my first variegated animal. Great photos and story, thanks!
LikeLike
Lol, he really is a variegated squirrel!
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s nice to discover new furred visitors to the garden and Rocky is a very handsome fellow. Rock squirrels live in Colorado, but I have never seen one in our neighborhood either. There are plenty of fox squirrels, though, who partake of the bird food. We put baffles on the feeders poles, so they can’t help themselves to the all-you-can-eat buffet, but plenty of seeds fall to the ground to keep their tummies filled.
I hope you will get to see Rocky again.
LikeLike
I think the Rock Squirrels must be shier or simply not as common. Those Fox Squirrels bedevil us all! They’re just too smart, I think! I hope Rocky comes back, I enjoyed seeing him in the garden.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I never thought about what kind of squirrels I have. Not growing up in Texas, anything that looks different I call Texas, such as Texas squirrel, Texas dandelions. I am doing a post on my squirrels in the future and maybe you could identify them.
LikeLike
You might enjoy this link, which I didn’t put in the post. https://www.texascapital.org/squirrels/
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks
LikeLike
I’ve never seen one of these. The dappled coat probably helps with camouflage in the trees and shadows. But yes, still a squirrel!
LikeLike
Yes, still a squirrel and probably just as much as a scamp as his Fox Squirrel brethren!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Happy new, as Eve likes to say. Two years ago we had a bunch of rock squirrels behind our house, apparently a mother and her recent litter. After a time they vanished, and no others have come into our yard that I’m aware of. Maybe twice I’ve seen an isolated one in northwest Austin. They sure are a lot less numerous than the fox squirrels.
LikeLike
I like that: happy new! Oh, I bet it was fun to to watch that family! You’re not that far from my ‘hood, but your topography is certainly different. I bet you have more of these than we do.
LikeLike
Agreed: our location just inside the Hill Country is probably more amenable to rock squirrels than the flatter and less forested area a little closer to downtown.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Gads! Just quite recently, a herd of ground squirrels moved in downstairs. I dislike them, but can not think of an excuse to evict them. They have been eating the bramble and weeds, which is actually rather helpful. They do not come up to eat desirable plant material. If I yell at them, they just stare at me as if concerned about my sanity.
LikeLike
Squirrels will always get the upper hand. They’re just too smart for us. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
and too manipulative. Other guys on the crew want to give them extra vegetables or vegetable scraps.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Have you seen the Backyard Squirrel Maze 1.0- Ninja Warrior Course? (Youtube)
There is also 2.0 and 3.0, but I like the 1st one the best. More on squirrels than….
LikeLiked by 2 people
I do not know. I saw a video of squirrels getting through a very complicated obstacle course. The squirrels seemed to enjoy the challenge.
LikeLike
I feed my squirrels peanuts and sometimes various fruit. There is one who’ll take it from my hand, but I know better (usually…) than to do that. I used to volunteer for a wildlife group and squirrels can bite!
LikeLike
A while back I thought of setting up a water cannon so I could push a button and squirt the miscreants as they robbed the bird feeders (them and the starlings).
I searched the web (surely someone has done this before) and I ran against a paper from an AI conference of a engineer who did this. He had the canon set up, had AI to recognize the squirrels. Gun would go off successfully. The engineering worked 100%.
The system was a complete failure. The squirrels are too smart.
First the squirrels learned that if they attacked the far side of the feeder, they were safe. Then they realized it was just water and started to ignore it. Worse yet, come deep summer, the squirrels actually would feed on the water side of the feeder so they could get squirted.
LikeLike
I’ve never heard of this squirrel. He’s so cute.
LikeLike
He is a pretty, pretty boy–hope he comes back!
LikeLike
Squirrels are such entertaining and fascinating creatures. They’re so dexterous and fast! I could watch them for hours. We don’t have that species here, but our gray squirrels and fox squirrels are fun little buddies, too. 🙂
LikeLike
They are so fun to watch. I’m sure your gray and fox squirrels keep you entertained, and maybe busy!
LikeLike
I’ve seen these around the Kerrville area, but here there’s a mix of gray and fox squirrels. At least I think I saw these: the ones I’ve encountered were more solidly black, without that beautifully patterned coat. I’ve noticed that ours are eating more well-watered greens in the landscape now, and sometimes ignoring the peanuts left for them. It may be seasonal, or that they crave the additional water from plants.
I did have a new experience the other day. A fox squirrel missing its tail showed up at my feeders. When I read how important the tail is for a squirrel, I did worry about it, but consoled myself by thinking that at least it had food and water available. I’ve not seen it since, so our neighborhood hawks may have found an easy meal.
LikeLike
Oh wow–they need those fluffy tails for balance. Did it look like it had an injury? Or maybe, some sort of weird birth defect? Poor little guy/gal.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I suspect injury. It might even have been the squirrel that amused itself by high-diving from the second story balcony down into the bushes. Or, it could be that the hawk that takes the occasional dove got ahold of it, and did some damage before dropping it. I still haven’t seen it again, which probably is better. If it was going to leave this world for the heavenly tree, I suppose it’s best that it happen sooner rather than later.
LikeLike
Well, I agree with that; certainly better than starving or getting injured/killed by a cat or dog.
LikeLike
I moved from Austin to San Antonio, and we have lots of ground squirrels here. They are handsome, and I have seen them in our yard, and also at the park nearby. We still have more of the regular squirrels. We enjoy watching them.
LikeLike
They are fun to watch. Is this Joan L.? I wondered why I don’t see you around anymore–hope you’re enjoying SA!
LikeLike
This is Joan L. I got married, and moved to sa, though I’m still working (2 days/ week) in Austin. (Overnighting w parents in austin when I work.)
Really enjoying your blog? Articles? – letting our st Augustine die, and learning about plants to play with that are beneficial for the birds, squirrels, etc…found a skink last week, he was cute. Thank you. 😎
LikeLike
It’s nice to hear from you! I knew you’d married, but didn’t know you’d moved. Hope your kids are doing well!
Yay for killing your St. Augustine grass! A native plants nursery opened in the last year or so in SA, but I don’t recall its name. I hope you find it and have loads of fun creating your wildlife habitat!
LikeLike
Hi Tina,
Yes, kids are doing well. How is – it’s Aaron, isn’t it? (But the spelling was different, yes? )
The native plant nursery did open last year, and I have not gone yet. It’s close to one of the nurseries that I like, and I actually found another one that does have lots of natives. (Spring Creek nursery- good plants, and they have a fairy garden, and other stuff, too. ) (I’m actually a little more excited about – we have a drainage ditch that the city mows every 6 months, and I went out in the Spring, and moved some verbena that I was sure was going to be killed when they mowed. 3/ 4 of them lived. They aren’t blooming now, but next Spring? I love the purple when they bloom. We are close to Hardberger park, and cycling on the trail when they were blooming was great! So I may actually plant verbena seeds in the fall and see what happens?
LikeLike
Plenty of “Rockys” around here but none are rock squirrels. Despite the little bothersome things they do, they are so much fun to watch and their acrobatics are impressive. We don’t leave bird seed feeders out any more since bears started coming for a free midnight snack but when we did have them out the squirrel proved genius in overcoming every obstacle I placed out there but one. There isn’t a squirrel around who can wrap its arms around an 8″ stove pipe so I stacked two around our tube feeder pole and that was that.
LikeLike
They are bothersome, but oh so entertaining! I also take my bird feeders in at night (rats! ugh!), but the squirrels mostly eat what drops on the ground. There is one particular squirrel who will come up to the kitchen window and look in, which is my queue to toss a few more peanuts on the ground.
LikeLiked by 1 person