squirrel play

Squirrels are often thought of as playful animals. A quick search of YouTube for “squirrels playing” will bring up a catalogue of videos showing jumping around, “play fighting” and “playing hide and seek” in the trees. In fact, in most cases I have seen, what has actually been captured is mating chases, which can look very similar to what we’d interpret as play behaviour – squirrels chasing one another back and forth through the branches, often with excited “chittering”. In such cases, however, play is far from the object and a female is being pursued by a group of testosterone-fuelled males vying for the lead position that brings with it the chance of mating with her. My intention here is not to cast stones, merely to illustrate that caution is necessary when interpreting behaviour