Mexico
Gallery
The easiest way to spot the Mexican Gray Squirrel is by visiting the Chapultepec forest in Mexico City. These animals can sometimes look similar to the Eastern Grays (common to the US), but these Mexican Grays have a lot more colour range.
Species & Variety
There are two subspecies of Mexican Gray (Gris Mexicana); Sciurus Aureogaster & Sciurus Nigrescens. From what I can tell, these are the former and the latter is more in the south & east of Mexico, as well as the south of Guatemala.
They are also called "Red-Bellied" (Vientre Rojo) squirrels, although they don't always have a red belly. The typical belly colour is a little deeper red than a Fox Squirrel (which there is a Mexican version of), but it can also be white, cream, yellow, grey, chocolate or black. They can have patches of those colours on their back and face, or they can be entirely one of those colours (more common with melanistic chocolatey black). They can have patches of white fluff behind their ears. Their tails can have a red inner core and/or a white halo, but none of these are rules. If this wasn't the only squirrel in this area, they could be quite difficult to identify.
Chapultepec Forest
Mexico City sits at 2,240m above sea level. That's over 300m higher than the mountain squirrels, above Arosa (sorry, all heights are relative to Swiss climbs for me). Chapultepec forest park sits inside a dormant Volcano. The active volcano (Popocatépetl), can be seen from the city (on rare, low smog days) 70km to the south, and is a staggering 5,452m high! That's 818m higher than the tallest mountain in Switzerland! Or, for the American audience; 3,383 feet higher than the tallest mountain in the Contiguous United States (mt. Whitney).
These squirrels can be found anywhere in the south & east of Mexico, from sea level up to 3,800m (which is the tree line around Popocatépetl volcano). Anywhere that has dense forests, of course.
This subtropical climate almost never gets down to freezing. The Mexican Gray squirrel can store extra body fat reserves, when the food sources are abundant. This is due to them not growing a thicker coat in winter (like the Eastern Gray), although we didn't see any chonky ones here (shame). They seemed to be more active than their US cousins, but it could also be related to climate and food.
Chapultepec Castle
The Chapultepec castle (National Museum of History), near the middle of the park, is a popular tourist destination. It is well worth the price of admission, but just a word of warning; If you have food for squirrels on you, they will make you throw it away on entering the castle grounds, so make sure you're done with the squirrels before going in here. It's possible that this rule exists to avoid encouraging the squirrels to go up to the castle. They also don't let you take water inside the castle grounds, which seems rather cruel on crazy hot days, but there are street vendors selling water at the exit at least. Most of the squirrels that we found were near the base of the hill that the castle sits on. You don't need to pay to go there
Food
Like most squirrels, these are omnivores. This means they eat fruits, vegetables, nuts, grains, tree sap and mushrooms, but also insects and even birds eggs if they need to. During extreme food scarcity periods, they can also eat plants, or even tree bark. These park squirrels should never go hungry with how many people come to feed them. Unlike European climates, the trees here don't fully lose their leaves during the winter, so that helps them to not go hungry over winter.
Feeding
Like most squirrels, the way they interact with the delicate human vending machines is quite different from how they interact with each other. When see them jumping, playing, fighting and generally being quite boisterous, you might be a little scared to offer food to something with incredibly sharp teeth and claws, but they are super gentle and peaceful when taking food from people. It helps to stick the food out closer to them, be slow and calm. We didn't have any accidental finger nibbles with these (like we do back home), but we were cautiously offering larger food here.
Neighbours
Wherever we found the squirrels, we also found the "Long-Tailed Grackle" (Quiscalus Mexicanus). They sound as beautiful as they look. This one is a male, the female is brown and with a shorter tail. We noticed that somebody put out food and water for the animals here, which was very sweat. It could be the park people, as the nature is a wonderful aspect of the experience. We assumed the birds were attracted to the same feeding areas as the squirrels, but to our surprise it rejected all the food that the squirrels seemed to like (walnuts, almonds and pecans). Instead, it seemed like more the snacks (sugary and salty) that people were dropping. We saw someone throw a crisp for the squirrel (please don't do that), but fortunately the squirrel rejected it.
Hunting
The Red-Bellied squirrel is considered to be a pest by agriculture farmers, which means they are exterminated near crops. They are also hunted for food. Despite this, they have been determined as a species of "least concern" when assessed for the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species in 2017.
More Photos
Here are some more images of the Red-Bellied squirrel from our trip...
