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COUNTRY NOTEBOOK: M. Krishnan : THE GIANT SQUIRREL : The Sunday Statesman : 23 November 2014

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" The Malabar Squirrel, in spite of its name, is by no means confined to Malabar. It is found in the Ooty area and in Mysore, in Karwar and in the foothills of the Himalayas - in many places in India where there are forests, especially semi-deciduous forests. Away from tall trees growing fairly close together, it is useless looking for Giant Squirrel ( as it is much happily named ), for it is highly arboreal creature that rarely comes down from the treetops.

The way it can race along the forest top, leaping from tree to tree, clearing the intervening air with easy grace, and deftly balancing itself on thin twigs, is truly amazing. It can hang upside down from the toeholds of its hind feet, and its great bottlebrush tail, which is fully half the length of the yard-long squirrel, is flung up as a balancer when it jumps from bough to bough.

When frightened by a too-close approach, it usually panics and bolts, and one has little chance of catching up with it again. But at times, when the sun is hot and it is not feeding or resting, it does not flee from scrutiny but climbs to the topmost boughs and hides in the foliage.

It can be comical in its comical in its concealment. As a rule, it is quite efficient in hiding, putting so much leaves between itself and the watcher that it is no longer visible. But occasionally it hides merely by stretching itself flat on its belly along a bough, and poking its head into the cover of leaves _ the fluffy, conspicuous, white-tipped tail hangs down like a banner, and the rich brown body is clear against leaf and bark, but having buried its head in the foliage, it feels secure! The Giant Squirrel can beat the Ostrich of the legend.

Most of the time, though, it is watching you, although its immobility might suggest you that it has gone to sleep - it peeps at you through chinks between leaves, and should you try to get close it will bolt. The best way to look at this handsome squirrel is to scout around and find a tree in which it has built its football-sized nest of woven twigs and leaves and fibre.

This nest is more often used for siestas than for the security of the next generation, and you often find several nests in the same tree. Provided and unhurried, casual and totally non-furtive approach is made, one can sit down ( much better to sit down when watching wild things - somehow this serves to reassure them ) not far from such a tree and study one's squirrels at leisure.

Giant Squirrels are often found in the same tree with the Common Langur, both animals being extremely tolerant of each other. I have seen a baby Langur, no bigger than a kitten and still clad in dark fur, playing about on a bough on which a Squirrel lay comfortably stretched, while the mother Langur sat in a crotch nearby, exhibiting not the least concern for her progeny.

The voice of the Giant Squirrel is in keeping with its size, a loud, metallic, rattling call, clearly audible a furlong away.

Sometimes the call is abbreviated to what corresponds to a cheep or two of the familiar striped squirrel, but recently I was surprised at the sustained silence that these big rodents can maintain when they want to be silent. In a week spent in forests where there were plenty of Giant Squirrels, I saw dozens but never heard one, they fled in silence at my approach, or else hid in the treetops, but not once did they sound their alarm. I remember how loud they were in their alarm calls, on previous encounters. I wonder why all the Squirrels of the area were so silent this time - I can think of no likely explanation."

-M. Krishnan

*This was first published on 4 May 1958 in The Sunday Statesman.
#The photograph of a giant squirrel hanging up-side down in the cage not reproduced here.