Red squirrel
Images copyright by Mark A. Chappell
The small, noisy red squirrel is characteristic of conifer forests throughout much of the Boreal and subpolar regions North america; the one above was photographed near Seward, Alaska. The animal in the images below images (eating spruce cones) was in Denali National Park. Red squrrels eat a lot of mushrooms, including ones highly toxic to humans: the squirrel below at left was eating and caching pieces of Amanita muscaria in an Achnorage, Alaska front yard. It placed dozens of mushroom chunks in the branches of a spruce tree, presumably to dry.
