Iowa’s 802 eastern gray squirrel records lean toward the wooded side of the state. Johnson County alone accounts for just over half of them, and the counties behind it, Scott, Linn, Dubuque, and Des Moines, trace a band of mature hardwoods along the Mississippi corridor and the larger river valleys.
A squirrel of the tall canopy
Gray squirrels want mature, connected deciduous forest with a heavy nut crop and old trees full of cavities, and Iowa’s best of that habitat sits in the east and northeast. The bluff forests at Effigy Mounds National Monument and the wooded Decorah and the Driftless Area landscape hold some of the state’s finest stands, with Mines of Spain State Recreation Area and Pikes Peak State Park adding more along the Mississippi bluffs. Big oaks, hickories, and walnuts in city parks and older neighborhoods let them do just as well in town, which helps explain Johnson County’s outsized tally.
Two busy seasons, no winter rest
Reports crest in April and May, then again in September and October, and both peaks come from the squirrel’s own schedule rather than any absence in between. Spring brings breeding chases and heavy movement through the canopy; autumn sends squirrels to the ground to scatter-hoard acorns and hickory nuts one at a time against winter. Gray squirrels do not hibernate. Through Iowa’s cold months they ride out storms in leaf nests or tree cavities and forage on mild days, so the winter dip in sightings says more about squirrel-watching weather than squirrel absence.
Status in Iowa
NatureServe ranks the eastern gray squirrel S5, Secure, in Iowa, and the species is native to the state. USGS NAS does not list it as nonindigenous here.
Full species profile
