As always, click the photo to enlarge. You’ll want to enlarge this one to fully appreciate how beautiful a squirrel can be.
A Delmarva Fox Squirrel (Sciurusnigercinereus) noshes on the fruit of greenbrier in the genus Smilax (I’m unsure of the species). This distinctive subspecies made the inaugural U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service listing of endangered species in 1967. At that time, the squirrel had plummeted in numbers, and was reduced to only four counties in Maryland’s eastern shore region. Thanks in large part to habitat restoration and protection, the beautiful rodent has rebounded and it was removed from the endangered list in 2015.
Seeing this large silvery squirrel, and hopefully making photos, was high on my list for this trip to Maryland and Virginia. Obviously I met with success, but the photography part wasn’t that easy. I found these squirrels to be rather bashful, and prone to running, scaling trees, or remaining in thick cover when approached.
But some perseverance paid off and eventually I was able to work with several animals and get nice images. I’ll try and make a more complete post on the Delmarva Fox Squirrel after I return home, including other imagery of them and their haunts.