Glow in the Dark Squirrels

 

At least in UV light they do. Southern Flying Squirrels.

We're lucky that we have these critters visiting our feeders almost every night and have for some time. And for the most part are rather tolerant of us humans.

I forget when I learned that Flying Squirrels turn pinkish-red under UV light. But photographing them went onto my to do list. But last fall-winter was not a good one for these critters. Few came to our 'peanut butter tree'. But this year they are back. Again coming to the tree as soon as we put the peanut butter out. And as it was a rather warm day, I decided to give it a go.

First I smeared some peanut butter on the aforementioned 'peanut butter tree', a Sweetgum in the Feeder Garden outside our living room.

I then strapped an ultraviolet flashlight to the tree, aiming up. You can see the peanut butter fluorescing.  

And then I waited. The Squirrels came, but wouldn't dally long enough in the light beam for me to get a shot. So I switched to plan b, handholding the UV light.

And it worked. Although most of the images were unusable.

They are very active, chasing each other about.

Note the 'ghost', just hints of pink, on the left of the trunk. And the more substantial 'ghost' on the right. Most shots weren't even this good. In fact, the only good head to tail shot I managed was that that led off this post.

No one is really sure why these critters glow like they do. And the discovery that they do was accidental. Another critter that fluoresces is the Virginia Opossum. And when I was out photographing the Squirrels one came looking for peanut butter. I shined the light on it and sure enough its face started glowing pink. But I scared it off when I moved the camera to try for a picture. A challenge for another night.