The Frémont squirrel is the most audacious and wide-awake of wild folk among whom I have lived. He appears to be ever up and doing, is intensely in earnest at all times and strongly inclined to take a serious view of things. Both the looks and manners of Mr. Frémont, Sciurus fremonti, proclaim for him a close relationship with the Douglas squirrel of California and the Pacific coast, the squirrel immortalized by John Muir.

His most popular name is "Pine Squirrel," and he is found through the pine and spruce forests of the Rocky Mountains and its spur ranges, between the foothills and timber-line; a vertical, or altitudinal, range of more than a mile. He assumes and asserts ownership of the region occupied. If you invade his forests he will see you first and watch you closely. Often he does this with simple curiosity, but more often he is irritated by your presence and issues a chatter[Pg 324]ing protest while you are still at long range. If you continue to approach after this proclamation, he may come down on a low limb near by and give you as torrential and as abusive a "cussing" as trespasser ever received from irate owner.

Yet he is most ridiculously small to do all that he threatens to do. Of course he brags and bluffs, but these become admirable qualities in this little fellow who will ably, desperately defend his domain against heavy odds of size or numbers. Among the squirrels of the world he is one of the smallest. He is clad in gray and his coat perceptibly darkens in winter. His plumy tail, with a fringe of white hairs, is as airy as thistledown. He always appears clean and well-groomed.

Though in many ways a grizzly in miniature and apparently as untamable as a tiger, the Frémont quickly responds to kind advances. Near my cabin a number became so tame that they took peanuts from my hand, sometimes even following me to the cabin door for this purpose.

These squirrels occasionally eat mushrooms,[Pg 325] berries, and the inner bark of pine twigs, but they depend almost entirely upon conifer nuts or seeds, the greater part of these coming from the cones of pines and spruces. They start harvesting the cones in early autumn, so as to harvest all needed food for winter before the dry, ripened cones open and empty their tiny seeds. Deftly they dart through the tree-tops almost as swiftly as a hummingbird and as utterly indifferent to the dangers of falling. With polished blades of ivory they clip off the clinging, fruited cones. Happy, hopeful, harvest-home sounds the cones make as they drop and bounce on the dry floor of the autumn woods. Often a pair work together, one reaping the cones with his ivory cutters and the other carrying them home, each being a sheaf of grain of Nature\'s bundling.

When harvesting alone, Mr. Frémont is often annoyed by the chipmunks. These little rascals will persist in stealing the fallen cones, despite glaring eyes, irate looks, and deadly threats from the angry harvester above. When finally he comes tearing down to carry his terrible ultimatums into effect, the frightened chipmunks make[Pg 326] haste to be off, but usually some one is overtaken and knocked sprawling with an accompanying rapid fire of denunciation.
THE HOME OF THE FRéMONT SQUIRREL THE HOME OF THE FRéMONT SQUIRREL
On the Little Cimarron

One day I watched a single harvester who was busily, happily working. He cut off a number of cones before descending to gather them. These scattered widely like children playing hide-and-seek. One hid behind a log; another bounced into some brush and stuck two feet above the ground, while two others scampered far from the tree. The squirrel went to each in turn without the least hesitation or search and as though he had been to each spot a dozen times before.

A squirrel often displays oddities both in the place selected for storing the cones and the manner of their arrangement. Usually the cones are wisely hoarded both for curing and for preservation, by being stored a few in a place. This may be beneath a living tree or in an open space, placed one layer deep in the loose forest litter scarcely below the general level of the surface. They are also stowed both in and upon old logs and stumps. Sometimes they are placed in little nests with a half-dozen or so cones each; often [Pg 327] there are a dozen of these in a square yard. This scattering of the sap-filled cones, together with the bringing of each into contact with dry foreign substances, secures ventilation and assists the sappy cones to dry and cure; if closely piled, many of these moist cones would be lost through mould and decay.

The numbers of cones hoarded for winter by each squirrel varies with different winters and also with individuals. I have many times counted upwards of two hundred per squirrel. During years of scanty cone-crop the squirrels claim the entire crop. The outcry raised against the squirrel for preventing far extension, by consuming all the seeds, is I think in the same class as the cry against the woodpecker; it appears a cry raised by those who see only the harm without the accompanying good. The fact is that many of the cones are never eaten; more are stored than are wanted; some are forgotten, while others are left by the death of the squirrel. Thus many are stored and left uneaten in places where they are likely to germinate and produce trees. John Muir too believes that the Doug[Pg 328]las and Frémont squirrels are beneficial to forest-extension.

Commonly the cones are stored in the same place year after year. In dining, also, the squirrel uses a log, limb, or stump year after year. Thus bushels of the slowly decaying scales and cobs accumulate in one place. It is not uncommon for these accumulations to cover a square rod to the depth of two feet.

I know of a few instances in which squirrels stowed cones in the edge of a brook beneath the water. One of these places being near my cabin, I kept track of it until the cones were used, which was in the spring. In early autumn the cones were frozen in, and there they remained, unvisited I think, until the break-up of the ............