Effect of a supplemental food supply on the reproductive attainment of the gray squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis)

The effect of a supplemental food supply on the reproductive attainment of the gray squirrel was investigated in the squirrel populations of two food supplemented Experimental and two Control woodlots near the campus of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, from December 1972 to June 1974. Mast, the major fall-winter food for the squirrel, was scarce to absent in the Fall of both 1972 and 1973. Due to the emigration of the residents of one of the Experimental woodlots in May of 1973, the study compared the reproductive, and other, responses of the squirrel populations in the remaining Experimental woodlot and the two Control woodlots. Two possible sources of supplemental food existed in one of the Control woodlots which may have influenced the reproductive attainment and survival of the squirrels in that area.