New Hampshire has 56 documented southern flying squirrel records, split between iNaturalist and GBIF. That’s a tally of confirmed sightings and specimens, not a count of how many squirrels are gliding through the state’s forests each night.
A range edge, not a state-wide glide
New Hampshire sits near the northern edge of this squirrel’s range, and that edge runs largely along elevation. The species needs mature deciduous forest, oak, hickory, or beech, for food and cavity trees to den in, cover that’s richest in the Merrimack Valley and the state’s lower, warmer hardwood stands. Higher on the White Mountains and the Presidential Range, the cold-adapted northern flying squirrel takes over in the spruce and fir, so records for this species thin out fast as elevation climbs, even inside parks like Franconia Notch and Mount Washington State Park, where reports concentrate in valley-floor hardwoods rather than the alpine summits above.
Records climb as squirrels move indoors
Reports peak in October, the single highest month on record. That timing lines up with fall nut caching and with a habit that puts this squirrel in front of more people: as the weather cools, it’s known to glide into attics, sheds, and bird feeders looking for food and shelter, turning a nocturnal, rarely seen animal into an occasional house guest.
Status in New Hampshire
NatureServe ranks the southern flying squirrel S5, secure, and it’s native to New Hampshire. It holds on at the northern edge of its range in the state’s lower hardwood forests, giving way to its northern relative once the elevation and the tree cover change.
