They are all over Michigan. Use to see them up in northern Michigan but now see them in Mid-Michigan. Dumb little suckers. Always seem to get hit by cars more than fox squirrels. They seem to freeze at the moment they should kick into high gear. Can't speak on the taste.

K9dude124

 

I know what you are talking about. They dont seem too bright. We were on a hike the other day with 2 dogs and I saw about 10 of them. They just freeze up out in the open. It would have been like shooting fish in a barrel.

Scott.

 

Black squirrels are nothing more than a color phase of the common grey squirrel. We have a fair share of them here in MI, often found in pockets throughout grey squirrel habitat. In some areas the black color phase even seems to dominate. Fox squirrels generally prefer a little different habitat than greys/blacks, but all three can be found togethor with some frequency.

Squirrel Grand Slam

Flavor of the meat is no different than their grey cousins.

Roe

 

The black squirrel is a color phase variant of the eastern gray squirrel.

The Wildlife Page

As I understand it, their evolutionary path was different enough from the grays to cause them to develop the black coat. Essentially, the black squirrel's habit of living in pine type trees and eating more of the pine seeds caused them to evolve into a color that blends in better with the bark and shaded confines of pine type trees.

I have seen squirrels mustering at first light and seen both grays and blacks come out of the same hole in a tree.

I also think the grays and blacks are tougher to hunt than the larger fox squirrel. They are smaller and more wary- but also don't loiter on the ground as much as the fox squirrels do. As for taste- I can't tell the difference. And that might be because I get them together in the same habitat- so they are all pretty much eating the same foods- so you know, you are what you eat. The fox squirrels might have a different taste and I think I have read others state that as fact. If there is a difference I would think it is due to the differences in diets.

I love squirrel hunting and squirrel eating.....

M

 

Nice bag Roe, and, as always....artfully composed with a classic firearm:biggrin:.
I haven't seen one here in NC yet, just grey's. First I saw was in Colorado many years ago.

 

I don't hunt squirrels. The 45-70 doesn't leave much after you shootem.....

 

We have a lot of these on our golf course ... good eatin', along with the geese.

 

South western Ohio used to have a lot of them back years ago...:hmmmm:

 

That's just weird lookin'.
Knock-knee'd 'lil rat.

 

We call them Eastern Fox Squirrels at the club .... but some people refer to them as black squirrels around here. We've got them everywhere in the state. Every year, the weekend after Thanksgiving, a bunch of us (members) meet at the club and thin them out some. We've harvested as many as 250 in a single day and not put a dent in them. In the spring the critters will run out in the fairway or onto the green and pick up your golf ball and take off with it. But they are are goooooood eatin'. They have all the chestnuts, pine nuts and acorns they could ever want on the golf course, plus they raid the trash cans for leftovers.

Now, we also have what we call Red Squirrels around here, along with the grays and blacks ... but our red squirrels are bigger and a lot of people refer to them as fox squirrels because some of them have white tips on their tails like the black faced fox squirrels in the picture I posted. We've also got what we call swamp squirrels around here, and they are just a variation of the grays. I once saw a big black bass come out of the water, knock a small swamp squirrel off a cypress tree, and then take him under when he was trying to swim back to the tree ... I presume he ate him.

 

I remember hunting them with my grandfather many years ago in Michigan. My grandmother used to cook them into a stew and they tasted very good. In recent years I have seen them while sitting in my deer blind.
Squirrel cooks up very tender and is delicious sweet meat. If you haven't tried it, you're missing something. :eating:

 

Where I live it is kinda unusual but not rare to see a black squirrel. In the area I live in everyone has acorn trees in their yards and on the way home thru the division I usually see 5 to 6 squirrels setting in peoples front yards and every week I will see a black one running around. It seems that there are more black ones showing up than in years past. I just though they were fox squirrels with their pigament messed up.

 

Grey, Red and Fox I see the most of. White and Black less often.

David

 

We have black squirrels in Wisconsin but they seem to be mostly north of Madison, WI. I have never seen any where we live in the southern end of the state.

 

never saw one irl, just on the interwebs.

 

I found a valley that has both black ones and white ones in it. This year I watched a very large gray with a white tip on his tail. Haven't decided if he would be worth mounting. I know where he lives. Might be pretty cool to have all three on a stump. Whatcha y'all think?

 

I think if you don't eat them, some other predator will. Or maybe they'll get extremely lucky and die of old age... Then it'll be a crow.

 

We have the black ones here in CT too. I didn't notice any difference from the gray-colored ones once they were dressed and they tasted the same.

 

I live in Northern Ohio, Canal Fulton. I just moved here from 6 miles north in New Franklin, aka Manchester or Portage Lakes.
We had a large number of black squirrels in my previous rural neighborhood because of the numerous black walnut trees just across the road on an old farm.
There were also many greys and they were far greater in number. When I first moved there in 1997 all of the black squirrels were about a mile east of me.
It took about 10 years for them to make their way down the road a mile west to my house and the old barn with the black walnuts.

I have not observed any black squirrels in Canal Fulton.

I am a Kent State alumni and black squirrels are dominant there on the main campus . At least they were back in 70's.

Maybe folks are afraid to talk about shooting black squirrels because they might be accused of using code words for hunting Black Americans.
Not really much of a stretch in today's PC America to expect such a ridiculous accusation. Even so, you might get a visit from the Secret Service.

Merry Christmas from that old North American Caucasian,

Doc 'Biscutbreath' Thornton

 

...We had a large number of black squirrels in my previous rural neighborhood because of the numerous black walnut trees just across the road on an old farm...

We must only have grey walnut trees around here then.

 

The black ones in northern MN do nothing but chase the greys. And the little red pine squirrels chase everything else.

 

Lamanite squirrels. I always see a bunch of them up in Canada near Toronto.

 

Well here we have the blacks and grey's and red cat squirrels. We dont have the true fox squirrels. Here the reds and blacks are the bigger squirrels and our greys are smaller. To see a fox squirrel I have to go about 100 miles either north or south to find them. They are probably close to twice the size of our local squirrels. The normal hunt here will end with about a even harvest of black and reds and a few greys. The greys are a lot harder to kill because they don't stop once spooked. I have seen them run completely out of the top of trees into mid air and the are super fast. The reds and black wil move a little ways and stop thinking they are hidden where the little greys head for the next county. I have always wanted to get a true fox squirrel mounted then add a grey and a red and black for comparison. I have seen a few but never had a gun right for taking them at the time for mounting.

 

Neat idea.

 

Don't see many black squirrels around here, but in Kenton TN just up the road, they're mighty proud of their white ones. Enough so that it's a big fine to kill one even accidentally.

 

Hi Scott, Last month she spottede a Black Squirrel in the center of New Haven, CT. at Yale Law School that is off York Street.

 

They are rare in SC.
But the two times I deer hunted in Michigan.
They were everwhere.
Gunrunner,,

 

There are white squirrels (also greys in a different color phase) in and around Marionville, Missouri. Best not get caught killing one!

Video -- White Squirrels -- National Geographic