The Best Nest

Each year at this time, I am strangely reminded of a line from a favorite movie from the 1970s. In Dog Day Afternoon, during the initial bank heist/hostage-taking scene, Al Pacino’s character spots a young secretary cowering under her desk. “Anybody here? What’s this, a squirrel?” he brusquely asks, before forcing the woman to join the rest of his hostages. I don’t know if the compelling thing is the comic absurdity during a tense situation, Pacino’s clipped Bridge-and-Tunnel accent, or simply the fascination I’ve held for the squirrel since childhood.

And never was my fascination more piqued than seeing squirrel nests in the wild.

As the leaves fall from the forest’s deciduous trees, the mysterious nests reveal themselves. Called winter dreys, the nests of the Easter Grey Squirrel (the species most common here) are built for warmth and to raise young born in late winter. The dreys are built in two layers – the outside of leaves and twigs for strength, and the inside lined with fur and found feathers for comfort and warmth. They are constructed at the junctions of tree branches high enough to protect from ground-dwelling predators, but not too high to be damaged by strong winter winds.

The red squirrel, known as a “mountain boomer” or “fairly-diddle” in mountain slang, were once numerous in our area. The decline of their population has a correlation with the demise of their preferred habitat, the American chestnut. The red squirrel was an important source of food for the crack sharpshooters of the Smoky Mountain foothills. Doyle Martin, a 96-year-old resident of West Millers Cove, where Blackberry Farm lies, describes bringing home 50 mountain boomers in a single day’s hunting trip in the late 1920s. A common family meal in the Martin house was fried squirrel, rice and gravy.

There are many squirrel nests to be seen high in the trees here at Blackberry Farm. Imagine that those strange clumps of leaves and twigs are a palatial estate, well-stocked with foraged acorns and nuts, to sustain a family of our most beloved forest creatures. Or perhaps just a place to hunker down until the jet to Havana arrives…

Jeff Ross, Garden Manager

Each year at this time, I am strangely reminded of a line from a favorite movie from the 1970s. In Dog Day Afternoon, during the initial bank heist/hostage-taking scene, Al Pacino’s character spots a young secretary cowering under her desk. “Anybody here? What’s this, a squirrel?” he brusquely asks, before forcing the woman to join the rest of his hostages. I don’t know if the compelling thing is the comic absurdity during a tense situation, Pacino’s clipped Bridge-and-Tunnel accent, or simply the fascination I’ve held for the squirrel since childhood.

And never was my fascination more piqued than seeing squirrel nests in the wild.

As the leaves fall from the forest’s deciduous trees, the mysterious nests reveal themselves. Called winter dreys, the nests of the Easter Grey Squirrel (the species most common here) are built for warmth and to raise young born in late winter. The dreys are built in two layers – the outside of leaves and twigs for strength, and the inside lined with fur and found feathers for comfort and warmth. They are constructed at the junctions of tree branches high enough to protect from ground-dwelling predators, but not too high to be damaged by strong winter winds.

The red squirrel, known as a “mountain boomer” or “fairly-diddle” in mountain slang, were once numerous in our area. The decline of their population has a correlation with the demise of their preferred habitat, the American chestnut. The red squirrel was an important source of food for the crack sharpshooters of the Smoky Mountain foothills. Doyle Martin, a 96-year-old resident of West Millers Cove, where Blackberry Farm lies, describes bringing home 50 mountain boomers in a single day’s hunting trip in the late 1920s. A common family meal in the Martin house was fried squirrel, rice and gravy.

There are many squirrel nests to be seen high in the trees here at Blackberry Farm. Imagine that those strange clumps of leaves and twigs are a palatial estate, well-stocked with foraged acorns and nuts, to sustain a family of our most beloved forest creatures. Or perhaps just a place to hunker down until the jet to Havana arrives…

Jeff Ross, Garden Manager