MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
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Must have been a good 50ft. Huge tree. It was the lowest branch. Nothing broke its fall. Thud.
It immediately jumped up, ran off at supersonic speeds, and scampered straight up the next tree.
I've always wondered if they ever fall, and now I know. But is this normal? Will the little guy be OK, or will he be slowly bleeding from his spleen?
If if was a Red - poor little thing.
If it was a Grey - **** 'im.
He'll be fine. I ran over one with my bike once; it scampered up the nearest tree, where it then sat glaring at me. Iwas convinced i'd crushed it's spine.
My wife is convinced that the hackney squirrels are fatter than the Enfiled ones. 😐
They don't get to a lethal terminal velocity due to their mass/surface area combination. Closer to a feather than an anvil.
Had it twice in my life. Once on the woods, once on a road ride while we were waiting for a puncture to be repaired.
SPLAT
And they both shot off without apparent injury.
I saw one bounce off the roof of the car in front of me still clutching the bit of branch that had clearly given way.
I had to swerve several times before I got him...
Being tree dwelling doesn't mean that a creature is immune from mishaps. Fifty percent of adult orangutans have fractured bones somewhere in their body. Branches break, distractions occur, etc.
I reckon it was that zippykona mistook it for a cat 😉
Yesterday I saw a squirrel fall out of a tree
Does this not herald the second coming or something like that?
I have read that cats can survive a fall from terminal velocity, due to their ability to slow themselves down.
I lay in bed once watching a squirrel leap from branch to branch some 70-80ft above me, and wondered the same thing: don't they ever fall? It was only a couple of days later when, just as I'd just crossed the stream outside the house, I heard a loud splash behind me. I turned in time to see the ever-increasing circles where something had landed some 6ft or so from the bank, then, a moment later, a sodden squirrel darted through the leaves on the bank and up the nearest tree. So, not only do squirrels fall out of trees, I learned, but they can also swim. Every day's a school day, if you're lucky.
The cat thing's interesting. Heard a radio interview with a New York vet who saw a lot of cats that had fallen from apartment windows. The ones who fell from the umpteenth floor had a better rate of survival than those who'd not fallen so far. He postulated that over a certain speed, a cat's skin is loose enough to act as a parachute.
Back on topic, a red squirrel ran across the road in front of me today with an acorn, which was nice as the last few I've seen were roadkill.
Wwaswas to the thread.....
The cat thing's interesting. Heard a radio interview with a New York vet who saw a lot of cats that had fallen from apartment windows. The ones who fell from the umpteenth floor had a better rate of survival than those who'd not fallen so far. He postulated that over a certain speed, a cat's skin is loose enough to act as a parachute.
That's completely daft, a parachutes job is to slow you down. If a cats parachuting ability only works over a certain speed then it's still going to hit the floor with more energy.
Unless you mean that the cats develop lift and are in a forward glide when they smack the floor - thus helping the cat absorb some of the energy in a forward roll.
My guess is that the cats shit scared in the first few meters of a drop, tenses up and then goes loose as it proverbially shits itself before it smacks the floor. Meaning that it's less likely to break bones etc.
What I wanna know is who is xraying wild Orangutans...
Usually when I see they fall out of a tree they don't get up again. I blame Messrs Webley & Scott
Wild ? They were livid !
For the cat thing, I heard once that cats require a certain distance falling to turn over so they were foot side down. Survival rates go up over a certain distance as they no longer land on their backs.
Saw some interesting footage of cats falling on YouTube. They actually turn themselves in two halves, front first and then the back. Makes sense really as they need something to rotate against.
If I was Three Fish, lying in bed looking up at squirrels in a tree, I'd want to know where my roof had gone!
If I was Three Fish, lying in bed looking up at squirrels in a tree,70-80 feet above me I'd want to know why I was asleep in an underground chamber with no roof .
My mums lurcher cross (possibly crossed with a wolverine) has killed over 100 grey squirrels.
FACT.
One leaped a good 25 feet from our fire escape, landing with a thud on the car park. It seemed ok as bounced off. I like squirrels, never understood some people's hatred of them though. They are acrobatic, fun to watch and intelligent (though adapting slowly to the perils of traffic)
[url= http://www.squirrels.info/uk/in_uk.htm ]red squirrel vs grey squirrel?[/url]
Saw some interesting footage of cats falling on YouTube. They actually turn themselves in two halves, front first and then the back. Makes sense really as they need something to rotate against.
Yup it's that rather an in built parachute.
My mums lurcher cross (possibly crossed with a wolverine) has killed over 100 grey squirrels.FACT.
Has it been trained to shake trees?
Saw some interesting footage of cats falling on YouTube.
truly, a sentence that heralds the End of Days.
Hope you pointed and laughed.
Last year one fell between my arms onto the top tube, brushed against my knee, fell to the ground and ran off. Have also seem them fail to jump across the canal via overhanging trees lolYesterday I saw a squirrel fall out of a tree
Good few years ago I was stuck in traffic in Greenwich in the big smoke.
Saw one just drop out of an over having tree and land in the back of a convertible with the roof down.
Scared the living crap out of the woman driving, I sat there stunned for a moment, not believing my eyes.
The cat thing is postulated to be because the cat needs a certain amount of time to right itself. If the fall isn't high enough it may not be able to sort itself out before impact.
I've seen a (serious) nature documentary before with some monkey or gibbon perhaps swinging through the trees, only to miss a branch in perfect comic style, disappearing followed a second later by a crashing of branches and a yelp. Pissed myself lauging for ages 🙂
Similar thing with northshore. If it's low, you're fine, if it's high enough, it gives you time to dismount but the bit in between (where most trail centres have/had it) is spot on for hurting yourself.
I was in a traffic queue once in a local town and a grey squirrel fell out of a tree in front of some of the cars in front. It sat stunned on the pavement whereupon a rural looking bloke got out of a dirty discovery picked it up by the tail and smashed its head on the kerb and chucked it in the hedge. I'm a professional forester so understand the grey issue. A lot of people in the queue were pretty horrified, it was like someone out of league of gentlemen or something....
Has it been trained to shake trees?
No somehow it gets them on the ground. Bloody thing!