By Stan Tekiela
The population of any given animal species in nature goes up and down over time in a geographic area. This is how nature works. Some years a species is plentiful and other years the population is dismal in a given area. These are the ebbs and flows of nature. I was reminded of this the other night while I stood outside my house in the dark and cold watching the Flying Squirrels that I love to see and feed.
For some reason, we people feel that nature should always be the same or the way we remember it to be. Or we feel that the population of a given species should remain the same over time. But this just isn’t the case. My Flying Squirrels in my yard are a good example of these classic population swings.
I have been feeding Southern Flying Squirrels (Glaucomys volans) for about 10 years in my yard. At one point I would get about 10 individual squirrels coming to a special feeder that I made just for the flyers. They were bold and didn’t care that I may be standing very close by or taking pictures of their crazy antics. This went on for many years.
Then about 2 years ago, the number of flyers coming into my feeder each evening dropped dramatically. And, at one point I had no flyers showing up for the peanuts that I put out for them to eat. While I have no proof of why the population dropped so quickly and dramatically, I worried that a pair of Barred Owls that had moved into the neighborhood might have been responsible. Having thought that, it is also possible that the Raccoons that recently had increased in the neighborhood also could be responsible for the dramatic decline in my Flying Squirrel population.
In addition to these predators, there are also any number of diseases that can cause a population crash of Flying Squirrels. Or a combination of predators and disease together can trigger the tipping point for any given population in a geographic location, sending it plummeting. No matter what the cause, or causes, it happens and not just to my Flying Squirrels but any population of wildlife and in any place like my yard or your property.
For the better part of a year and a half, I didn’t get any Flying Squirrels coming to my feeding station. I was devastated. Every now-and-then I might get one flyer to show up in the wee hours of the morning but nothing like I had in the past. I just didn’t see them like I used to.